OF  THE 


MARJORIE 


GREENBIE 


Courtesy  Canadian  Pacific  Railway 

The  harbour  of  Vancouver  on   an   afternoon  betwixt 
winter  and  spring 


IN  THE  EYES  OF 
THE  EAST 


BY 

MARJORIE  BARSTOW  GREENBIE 

WITH   ILLUSTRATIONS 


NEW  YORK 
DODD,  MEAD  AND  COMPANY 

1921 


COPYRIGHT  1921 
BY  DODD,  MEAD  AND  COMPANY,  INC. 


PRINTED    IN    THE    U.  8.  A.  BY 

Q3ie  (Sutnn  &  JBoben  Contpanp 

BOOK      MANUFACTURERS 


DEDICATION 

Forgive  me,  dear,  that  I  unclose 

These  garden-gates  of  memory. 
When  there's  romance  that  blooms  and  grows 

So  gay  and  fair  and  strange  to  see, 
There's  not  a  fence  so  tall  and  stout 
That  it  can  keep  the  whole  world  out. 

The  passer-by  will  snatch  by  stealth 

A  look  and  gossip  as  he  goes ; 
The  bandit  breeze  will  filch  the  wealth 

Of  perfume  in  our  hoarded  rose; 
And  birds  and  bees  and  butterflies 
Go  up  and  down  to  advertise. 

Our  memories  are  confiscate. 

There's  nothing  left  for  you  and  me 
But  to  play  host  before  the  gate 

To  which  the  whole  world  holds  the  key, 
And  hope  to  save  some  private  dream 
In  all  this  communist  regime. 


20G5SG9 


PREFACE 

THIS  record  has  grown  from  chapter  to  chapter  in 
response  to  the  question  of  the  audience:  "What  next?" 
Beginning  as  a  somewhat  casually  selected  episode  from 
my  journey  around  the  world,  in  a  current  periodical,  it 
developed  from  month  to  month  as  entertainment  for 
willing  readers — 'till,  lo,  there  was  a  book !  At  the  same 
time  various  reporters'  stories  of  my  peregrinations  had 
circulated  in  the  press,  and  had  been  copied  by  weekly 
digests — till  one  great  and  enterprising  newspaper 
syndicate  capped  the  climax  by  turning  the  trip  into  a 
most  gaudy  love-story,  and  sending  it,  with  appropriate 
illustrations,  into  every  hamlet  in  America.  The  pub- 
licity thus  given  to  a  detail  which  I  had  treated  rather 
lightly  in  my  published  account  must  be  my  excuse  for 
enlarging  on  it  in  the  book.  At  least  I  may  hope  that, 
in  the  popular  imagination,  my  own  version  will  sup- 
plant the  newspaper  story.  If  any  further  excuse  is 
needed  for  thus  trailing  the  romance  of  my  own  little 
life  across  the  broad  face  of  the  world,  I  must  urge  that 
it  is  the  necessary  explanation  of  the  chain  of  events 
narrated  in  the  second  half  of  the  book,  and,  if  I  did  not 
tell  the  truth,  I  should  be  hard  put  to  it  to  find  a 
plausible  substitute.  But,  after  all,  what  I  have  told 
is  not  what  is  private  and  personal  to  myself  (for  that 
remains  inviolate).  I  have  given  the  world  only  so 
much  as  corresponds  to  the  oldest  formula  of  romance 
in  literature  and  so  has  a  kind  of  universality.  And  I 
hope  that  the  reader  will  read  into  my  story  throughout 
not  the  experience  of  a  private  individual  at  all  but  the 
symbol  of  his  own  dreams  and  hopes. 

For  the  rest,  I  have  tried  to  give  as  living  a  picture  as 
I  could  of  the  great  pageantry  of  life  upon  the  highways 
of  the  white  man's  Orient — to  present  typical  indi- 
viduals among  those  who  go  back  and  forth  upon  the 

vii 


viii  PEEFACE 

borderline  where  the  two  great  civilizations  of  the  world 
are  now  coming  together — to  show  the  white  man  shaped 
and  subdued  to  the  environment  of  the  East,  and  the 
life  of  the  Oriental  sometimes  confused,  sometimes 
shattered,  but  sometimes  stimulated  to  wonderful  new 
vitality  by  the  mighty  impact  of  the  West.  As  one  or 
another  personality  emerged  from  the  changing  throngs 
upon  my  path  around  the  world,  I  have  sketched  him, 
swiftly  and  lightly.  And  I  offer  this  collection  of  minia- 
tures for  what  they  are  worth  in  the  interpretation  of 
the  larger  issues  of  Eastern  life. 

Yet  I  need  hardly  say  that  I  have  clung  as  strictly  as 
possible  to  fact.  The  people  in  this  book  are  all  real 
people  who  still  go  up  and  down  upon  the  highways  of 
the  world.  Only  in  some  cases  I  have  introduced  a  de- 
liberate, though  transparent,  confusion  of  non-essential 
detail,  in  order  to  provide  any  one  who  wishes  to  dis- 
claim the  portrait  with  an  alibi.  In  some  cases,  too,  I 
have  used  the  dramatist's  license,  and  have  concentrated 
into  brief  episodes  what  was  more  widely  scattered  in 
time  and  space.  But  such  liberties  are  comparatively 
rare,  and,  on  the  whole,  my  narrative  is  as  close  to  fact 
as  common  courtesy  and  the  art  of  the  raconteur  will 
permit.  I  have  been  under  no  temptation  to  invent,  be» 
cause  the  truth  was  always  much  more  interesting  than 
anything  I  could  imagine.  Yet,  just  because  I  was  tell- 
ing of  unknown  people  and  incidents  that  would  offer  no 
inspiration  to  the  newspaper  headline,  I  have  adhered 
to  one  principle  which  seems  necessary  to  raise  such  a 
record  above  triviality:  /  have  written  only  of  facts 
and  people  who  would  be  interesting  if  they  were  ficti- 
tious. And  so  I  have  tried  to  put  into  my  book  not  only 
the  pageantry  of  the  East,  but  a  little  of  the  common 
heart  of  humanity. 

It  remains  only  to  acknowledge  my  indebtedness  to 
two  people  who  have  made  this  story  possible.  To 
Karl  E.  Harriman  I  owe  a  special  debt  of  gratitude  for 
inspiring  the  original  narrative  and  for  providing  me 
with  my  first  audience,  as  well  as  for  his  kindly 
co-operation  and  enthusiasm  throughout.  To  my  hus- 


PREFACE  ix 

band,  Sydney  Greenbie,  I  owe  a  debt  less  easy  of  defini- 
tion— not  only  for  valuable  criticism  in  detail,  but  for 
constant  stimulus  to  my  own  flagging  impulse  to  write, 
and  for  the  contagious  earnestness  and  integrity  of  his 
own  literary  ideals,  as  well  as  for  a  world  of  help  and 
sympathy  to  which  no  public  announcement  can  be 
adequate. 

MARJORIE  BARSTOW  GREENBIE. 

•GREENSBORO,  VERMONT, 
August  17,  192L 


PKELIMINARIES 

OF  the  vast  world  of  waters  that  lies  between  Vancouver 
and  Shanghai,  and  the  manners  of  men  who  travel  de 
luxe  upon  those  seas.  I  introduce  the  Bishop  and  the 
Bishop's  incorrigible  daughter. 

Five  o'clock  in  the  harbour  of  Vancouver  on  an  after- 
noon betwixt  winter  and  spring.  For  here,  on  the  shores 
of  the  northern  Pacific,  spring  had  already  risen  like  an 
exhalation  from  the  waters,  sweet  with  the  promise  of 
cherry  blossoms  in  Japan  across  the  way,  and  scents 
from  the  far  South  Seas.  Already  the  fresh  green  ran 
up  to  meet  the  snow  upon  the  mountains,  and  a  mist  of 
young  verdure  seemed  to  drift  and  cling  among  the 
pines.  But  beyond  the  vast  rampart  of  the  Canadian 
Rockies  winter  still  lay  heavy  upon  the  plains. 

The  mind  of  the  traveller  is  superstitious.  He  likes 
some  omen  of  wind  and  weather  to  speed  him  on  his 
way.  And  so,  as  we  steamed  slowly  out  into  the  Pacific, 
bound  by  the  swift  northern  route  for  Yokohama  and 
Shanghai,  the  breath  of  balm  that  mingled  with  the  cool- 
ness of  the  water  was  like  an  emanation  of  friendship 
from  the  face  of  the  deep  and  turned  my  eyes  with  glad- 
ness to  that  mysterious  horizon  where  West,  at  last,  is 
East.  Yet  I  suppose  there  is  no  more  prosaic  method  of 
invading  the  Orient  than  that  which  fortune  had  marked 
out  for  my  course.  I  was  going  first  class  on  one  of  the 
greatest  steamers  on  the  Pacific  for  a  tour  upon  the 
beaten  highways  of  Japan  and  China,  under  the  escort 
of  a  Bishop,  the  Bishop's  Lady,  and  the  Bishop's  incor- 
rigible daughter.  Safely  and  sedately  I  was  going  forth, 

zi 


xii  PRELIMINARIES 

and  safely  and  sedately  I  might  have  returned.     But  I 
did  not,  and  thereby  hangs  the  tale. 

For  romance  will  burgeon  and  blossom  in  the  heart 
of  youth  astray  in  the  world,  and,  as  the  American  shore 
turned  cloudlike  in  our  rear,  and  the  pale  wastes  of  the 
Pacific  widened  around  us,  my  spirit  was  already  stir- 
ring with  presages  of  adventures  whose  fulfilment  I 
could  not  yet  foresee.  Straight  into  the  sun  we  steered. 
Then  suddenly  those  wastes  of  sky  and  sea  were  as  one 
light,  and  the  waters  rolled  flaming  away,  as  if  there 
were  no  horizons  any  more  and  they  might  break  at  last 
upon  the  margins  of  some  far  cloud,  or  the  uttermost 
bounds  of  ether.  Only  the  gulls  which  had  come  to 
escort  us  out  to  sea  seemed  at  home  in  that  great 
splendour,  and  wheeled  and  circled  betwixt  gold  and  " 
gold  with  the  sunlight  upon  their  wings.  Standing  upon 
the  forward  deck,  too  much  a  stranger  to  my  shipmates 
as  yet  to  mark  their  chatter  around  me  more  than  the 
squeaking  of  the  gulls,  I  felt  for  a  moment  like  one  who 
has  slipped  all  earthly  ties,  and  is  afloat  in  pure  space. 

I  thought  of  the  "wild  surmise"  of  those  who  first  saw 
this  new  world  of  water,  "silent  upon  a  peak  in  Darien," 
and  of  the  prayer  of  Drake,  who,  climbing  "a  great  and 
goodlie  tree"  in  the  Isthmus  to  verify  the  fable  of  the 
liquid  space  beyond,  had  prayed  that  God  would  give 
him  life  and  leave  to  sail  once  in  a  ship  on  that  sea. 
And  God  heard  him,  as  He  has  a  way  of  hearing  such 
prayers  on  the  lips  of  Englishmen.  Was  not  this 
journey  of  mine  a  heritage  from  his  adventures,  and  this 
great  British  ship  on  which  we  were  now  so  securely 
afloat  only  the  last  in  a  long  line  of  vessels  which  had 
never  ceased,  from  generation  to  generation,  to  take 
up  Drake's  challenge  to  Heaven  and  this  masterless 
world  of  waters? 


XI II 

So  I  thought  as  I  waited  for  the  coming  of  the  stars. 
For  some  one  had  told  me  that  the  great  clipper,  which 
is  the  guide  of  all  sailors,  would  have  that  night  a 
message  for  me,  and  its  seven  stars  would  write  the  seven 
letters  of  a  word  of  familiar  endearment.  This  romantic 
and  imaginary  tryst  I  was  not  allowed  to  carry  out  un- 
disturbed, for  the  Bishop  and  the  Bishop's  Lady  and  the 
Bishop's  incorrigible  daughter  descended  to  renew  their 
acquaintance  with  the  girl  who  had  been  committed  to 
them  for  chaperonage  and  safe-keeping  upon  the  high 
seas.  Concerning  the  Bishop  and  the  Bishop's  Lady,  I 
shall  have  more  to  say  anon.  He  was  a  wise,  gentle,  and 
humorous  soul,  so  much  a  Christian  that  one  forgot  all 
about  it  and  thought  of  him  as  only  perfectly  a  gentle- 
man. She  was  a  simple  and  loving  woman,  very  up- 
to-date  in  costume  but  essentially  the  daughter  of  an- 
other age  than  ours.  Her  friends  liked  to  call  her 
"Lady,"  and  that,  perhaps,  tells  what  there  is  to  tell 
about  her.  Yet  she  was,  I  think,  what  most  men  would 
like  their  sweethearts  to  be  after  twenty-five  years  of 
marriage ;  and  neither  for  her  nor  for  her  husband  had 
the  freshness  and  zest  of  love  as  yet  gone  by. 

But  the  Incorrigible  Daughter — there  was  the  queen 
flapper  of  our  day  of  flappers!  Dorothy,  at  the  age  of 
seventeen,  had  already  asserted  her  right — which  she 
called  her  duty — to  be  her  father's  aid  and  comfort  on 
his  periodical  exiles  to  the  Orient.  Not  that  she  had  any 
religion.  She  always  professed  that  she  had  not,  espe- 
cially at  moments  when  the  profession  was  inopportune. 
She  was  adorned  with  none  of  the  traditional  Christian 
graces,  neither  with  meekness  nor  silence  nor  chaste 
braided  locks.  She  called  bishops  and  other  ecclesi- 
astical personages  by  nicknames  of  her  own  creation, 
and  established  rapid  flirtations  with  all  nice  young  mis- 


xiv  PKELIMINAKIES 

sionaries— married  or  single.  She  spied  upon  what  she 
chose  to  call  my  "love-affairs,"  and  paraded  them  to  my 
discomfiture.  She  collected  my  mail,  and  attached  a 
complete  romance  to  each  letter,  which  she  retailed  with 
gusto  to  the  missionaries.  She  always  repeated  my  most 
foolish  remarks  to  the  Bishop.  And  when  her  sins  drew 
down  upon  her  a  well-merited  rebuke,  she  would  re- 
mark with  an  air  of  serene  condescension : 

"Now,  Dad,  you  don't  understand.  Why,  that's  this 
New  Woman  stuff  I  got  from  Marjorie." 

Yet,  withal,  she  was  a  little  thorough -bred,  with  the 
thorough-bred's  infallible  instinct  for  the  line  which 
separates  impertinence  from  vulgarity  and  teasing  from 
unkindness — a  creature  of  wind  and  sunshine  and  re- 
vivifying spring  squalls,  and  the  jolliest  young  pagan 
that  ever  trod  on  an  episcopal  toe. 

So  now,  adroitly  detaching  herself  and  me  from  our 
elders,  she  whispered,  as  she  exuberantly  squeezed  my 
arm,  that  she  had  picked  out  "just  the  man"  for  me. 
It  was  one  of  Dorothy's  beliefs  that  this  journey  of  ours 
to  Japan  and  China  was  to  end  in  a  double  bridal  for 
herself  and  me,  with  her  father  officiating.  This  being 
the  case,  she  was  naturally  anxious  to  get  on  with  the 
preliminaries.  So,  though  we  were  not  yet  an  hour  out 
of  sight  of  land,  one  hero  was  discovered  and  she  has- 
tened to  make  me  acquainted  with  my  fate. 

"There  he  is,"  she  whispered,  rapturously.  He  was 
a  tall  man,  sombre,  homely,  and  forbidding.  I  was  not 
impressed. 

"Oh,"  said  Dorothy,  "he  looks  like  that  because  he  is 
a  high-brow.  You  are  a  high-brow,  and  high-brows 
should  always  marry  high-brows  because  no  one  else 
feels  natural  with  them.  Q.  E.  D.,  my  dear."  And  she 
proceeded  with  the  details  of  the  wedding. 


PRELIMINARIES  xv 

Just  then  the  high-brow  opened  his  lips,  in  confidence 
to  a  squat,  red  man,  who  stood  by  him  puffing  smoke 
like  a  volcano :  "  'God  damme,  my  dear/  sez  I  to  the 
little  dame,  'this  is  the  foist  time —  '  .  .  . 

The  assemblage  at  dinner  an  hour  or  so  later  gave  us 
a  chance  of  reviewing  our  impressions,  and  of  being  our- 
selves reviewed  and  classified.  The  life  of  a  great 
Pacific  liner  is  something  unique  in  itself,  and  a  presage 
of  a  certain  elaboration  of  social  life  in  the  cosmopolitan 
foreign  communities  of  the  East,  which  has  little  place 
in  America  beneath  the  ranks  of  the  plutocracy  and  the 
plutocracy's  intellectual  retainers.  It  was  amusing  to 
see  the  awkwardness  of  some  of  the  novices — mostly 
salesmen  representing  American  firms — who  appeared 
at  dinner  without  tuxedos.  No  doubt  they  had  come 
prepared  to  hob-nob  with  friendly  cannibals,  in  the  lat- 
est fashion  of  the  Pacific,  or  at  least  to  show  the  heathen 
natives  a  thing  or  two.  And  here  they  were,  flabber- 
gasted at  the  outset  by  promotion  to  amenities  that 
"regular  he-men"  in  America  are  still  privileged  to 
scorn.  One  or  two  simple  souls  from  Kansas  were  im- 
pressed by  the  fact  that  a  red-haired  dame  at  the  table 
near  us,  who  looked  like  the  Queen  of  the  Visigoths,  was 
addressed  as  "Lady  Brandon,"  and  her  husband  as  "Sir 
James."  Here  was  a  real  title,  the  kind  you  read  about 
in  books,  and  one  could  really  sit  next  to  it  at  dinner. 
Then,  of  course,  there  were  the  seasoned  travellers  de 
luxe  upon  these  seas,  easy,  suave,  dressed  as  if  born 
in  the  dinner  jacket,  and  anxious  to  determine  what  our 
status  would  be  in  the  foreign  settlements  on  the  other 
side  and  to  order  their  own  behaviour  accordingly. 

As  we  took  our  seats,  I  was  conscious  of  the  conven- 
tion which  on  these  Pacific  liners  sharply  separates  the 
sheep  from  the  goats — alias  the  missionaries  from  the 


xvi  PRELIMINARIES 

poker-players.  There  are,  of  course,  a  number  of  people 
who  feel  that  they  fall  neither  into  the  one  category 
nor  the  other.  They  find  unlimited  whiskey  and  poker 
about  as  bad  as  unlimited  psalms.  But  on  board  a  Pa- 
cific liner  there  is  no  via  media.  Every  one  looks  for 
a  declaration  of  faith  at  the  outset.  If  the  condition 
of  your  soul  is  favourable,  the  missionaries  surround  you 
and  close  you  in,  and  the  rest  of  the  ship  avoids  you 
thereafter  as  one  too  good  for  this  world. 

In  our  own  case  decision  hung  in  the  balance.  Our 
general  appearance  was  sufficiently  fashionable  to 
temper  the  hospitality  of  the  church  and  encourage  the 
worldly.  The  Bishop,  appearing  at  dinner  in  his  tuxedo, 
with  no  decoration  of  his  calling  about  Mm,  was  a  man 
to  grace  any  saloon,  and  Lady  yielded  to  no  one  on 
board  in  de'colletage  and  manner.  Hence,  there  ensued 
in  our  fellow  passengers  a  little  struggle  between  the 
worship  of  position  and  the  dislike  of  Christianity, 
which  are  the  two  ruling  passions  of  the  lay  communities 
of  the  Orient. 

At  dinner  we  were  joined  by  a  man  who  supplied  all 
the  odour  of  sanctity  which  our  party  lacked.  He  was 
very  tall  and  broad,  with  superfluous  rolls  and  protuber- 
ances of  flesh  all  over  his  anatomy,  one  of  those  men 
whose  soul  is  pretty  well  muffled  in  its  fleshly  tabernacle. 
Perhaps  for  that  reason,  he  wore  the  extreme  form  of 
the  clerical  costume  which  his  sect  allowed  him.  He 
had  an  unctuous  smile  and  a  loud  voice,  and,  as  he 
entered  the  dining  saloon,  booming  and  beaming  above 
that  mighty  expanse  of  flesh  and  black  broadcloth,  he 
was  not  an  unimpressive  figure.  Many,  indeed,  took 
him  for  the  Bishop,  a  mistake  he  never  corrected  then  or 
afterwards.  As  the  Bishop  sank  quietly  and  humor- 
ously into  the  role  of  mere  private  gentleman  beside 


PRELIMINARIES  xvii 

him,  his  personality  seemed  to  expand  and  grow  sonor- 
ous, till  he  dominated  the  whole  saloon. 

Christian  benevolence — or  whatever  he  called  it- 
flowed  from  him,  in  a  mighty  flood  of  compliment  and 
pious  appreciation  addressed  principally  to  the  ladies  of 
the  party,  but  including  the  Bishop,  too,  in  its  con- 
descension. But  this  was  nothing  to  the  emotion  that 
the  bill  of  fare  aroused  in  him.  He  had  been  dining  a 
la  carte  in  war-times  all  across  the  continent ;  and  such 
a  table  d'hote,  such  a  confusion  and  glory  of  food,  not 
to  be  paid  for  piece-meal  out  of  the  cash  in  his  pocket, 
but  handed  out  as  a  free  gift,  wholesale, — this  seemed 
to  stir  him  to  a  passion  mightier  than  love  and  religion. 
He  ordered  everything,  and  repeated  the  order  for  every- 
thing he  liked.  He  kept  all  the  boys  who  waited  on  the 
table  scampering  to  and  fro,  till  the  orders  of  the 
rest  of  us  were  overwhelmed  in  the  procession  of  dishes 
that  came  to  him ;  and  all  the  while  his  spirits  rose  and 
his  tongue  was  unloosed  and  his  benevolence  reached  out 
to  inundate  us  all.  His  speech  alternated  between  moral 
and  religious  sentiments,  delivered  with  a  kind  of  warm, 
sensuous  enthusiasm,  and  sentimental  stories  for  the 
benefit  of  the  ladies,  which  would  have  been  risque',  had 
not  a  wedding  or  at  least  a  betrothal  been  always 
thoughtfully  introduced  somewhere  in  the  course  of  them 
to  save  our  blushes.  He  abounded,  indeed,  in  stories  of 
young  love  and  its  manifestations,  after  which  he  would 
insinuate,  with  his  eye  resting  warmly  on  Dorothy  or 
me,  that  our  "time  was  coming."  Most  of  these  he 
boomed  out  in  so  large  a  voice  that  the  sum  and  sub- 
stance of  them  reverberated  from  end  to  end  of  the 
saloon.  Cosmopolitan  as  I  had  begun  to  fancy  myself, 
I  blushed  like  any  flapper,  and,  when  the  Queen  of  the 
Visigoths,  who  had  already  showed  some  disposition 


xviii  PRELIMINARIES 

to  be  friendly,  glanced  at  me,  between  amusement  and 
pity,  and  whispered  something  to  her  husband,  I  thought 
a  shipwreck  would  be  a  welcome  interruption,  or  at  least 
an  immediate  descent  into  the  most  private  caverns  of 
the  sea. 

This  person,  it  seems,  was  to  travel  with  us — at  least 
till  we  could  impose  him  on  some  one  else  in  China. 
He  was  going  out  to  see  the  missions  at  first  hand,  and 
garner  enthusiasm  at  its  source.  For  he  was  famous  as 
a  collector  of  money  for  missionary  causes,  and  this  trip 
had  been  presented  to  him  by  the  Board  of  Missions,  in 
gratitude  for  the  past,  and  lively  expectation  of  favours 
to  come.  Travelling  with  a  Bishop  involves  social  vicis- 
situdes. Wistfully  I  thought  of  those  days  at  the 
Canadian  hotel,  but  just  foregone,  when,  as  part  of  the 
train  of  "His  Grace,"  we  had  been  made  to  feel  ourselves 
kin  to  the  lords  of  the  earth.  But  now  petty  clerks  and 
salesmen  all  around  us,  whose  only  passport  to  social 
recognition  was  an  expense  account,  were  beginning  to 
look  with  suspicion  upon  us  because  we  belonged  to  the 
church.  And  here  was  this  person  to  justify  their  ex- 
pectations. 

Only  the  Bishop  was  suave  and  humorous  as  ever. 
He  was,  by  this  time,  used  to  being  a  Bishop,  I  suppose. 
After  dinner,  as  we  were  standing  in  the  dancing  saloon, 
our  new  companion  joined  us. 

"Brother  Barnes,"  said  the  Bishop,  "are  you  dancing 
to-night?" 

"Bishop,"  said  the  good  brother,  giving  an  exhibition 
of  what  the  old  novelists  mean  by  drawing  himself  to 
his  full  height,  "Bishop,  I  don't  dance." 

"Don't  you?"  said  the  Bishop,  in  a  tone  of  pleasant 
surprise,  ignoring  the  shocked  expression  on  his  face. 
"Well,  it  is  never  too  late  to  learn,  you  know.  Here," 


PRELIMINARIES  xix 

he  added,  indicating  me,  whose  dislike  of  this  brother  in 
Christ  was  now,  I  am  afraid,  sufficiently  obvious,  "here 
is  a  nice  lady  to  teach  you." 

I  suppose  Freud  would  say  that  the  state  in  which  I 
awoke  next  morning  was  due  to  a  latent  wish.  For  I 
was  hopelessly  sea-sick,  and  could  make  my  appearance 
no  more  in  company  with  our  new  friend.  For  four  days 
and  four  nights  I  lay  below  and  cursed  the  day  I  was 
born,  except,  of  course,  when  I  rejoiced  to  think  what 
social  complications  I  was  missing.  Dorothy  visited  me 
with  hourly  attentions  and  bulletins  about  life  on  ship- 
board, and  full  and  dramatic  accounts  of  the  gastric 
achievements  of  our  bete  noire.  Realizing  what  a  good 
tonic  this  type  of  narrative  is  in  cases  of  mal  de  mcr, 
Dorothy  would  enumerate  the  number  and  quantity  of 
dishes  that  he  had  consumed  at  dinner.  Then  she  would 
tell  how  he  had  arisen  and,  with  the  marks  of  his  de- 
bauch still  upon  him,  had  gone  around  and  preached 
to  the  inhabitants  of  the  smoking  room  on  the  evils  of 
tobacco.  They  didn't  feel  the  effects  of  it  immediately, 
of  course,  he  said,  but  they  would  in  the  long  run;  for 
the  temple  of  our  body  is  sacred,  and  we  owe  it  to  the 
Creator  who  gave  it  to  us  not  to  introduce  anything 
that  poisons  and  pollutes  it. 

After  the  fourth  day,  I  was  again  on  deck.  Very 
bright  and  stirring  it  seemed,  that  vast  and  tossing  body 
of  water  beneath  the  sun.  There  was  something  splen- 
did in  the  way  our  ship  smashed  through  the  great 
waves,  flinging  the  spray  to  the  light,  and  crushing  the 
water  into  foam.  We  were  skirting  the  Arctic  regions 
now,  passing  the  long  chain  of  islands  into  which  the 
peninsula  of  Alaska  disintegrates — and  drawing  so  near 
at  last  that  we  could  see  the  smoke  from  a  volcano  on 
one  of  them.  At  the  one  hundredth  and  eightieth  me- 


xx  PRELIMINARIES 

ridian  we  left  one  of  the  days  of  our  week,  without  hav- 
ing any  chance  to  sample  its  possibilities  of  joy  or  sor- 
row.   We  went  to  sleep  on  Tuesday  night  and  awoke  on 
Thursday  morning.    Thursday  was  a  dead  loss,  too,  for 
it  took  the  whole  of  it  to  explain  this  phenomenon  to 
Dorothy,  as  well  as  to  show  why  the  quickest  route  to 
Japan  was  a  detour  by  way  of  the  North  Pole. 
"But,"  I  said,  "it's  all  because  the  earth  is  round." 
"Oh,  that's  a  yarn  I  never  did  believe,"  said  Dorothy, 
closing  the  demonstration  with  a  yawn. 

But  for  me  this  obvious  illustration  of  something  I 
had  always  taken  on  faith  was  re-assuring  to  the  im- 
agination. I  felt  like  some  Christian  arriving  in  the 
New  Jerusalem  and  finding  that  the  streets  are  of  gold 
after  all.  For  there  is,  doubtless,  a  certain  amount  of 
hypocrisy  in  the  way  we  are  taught,  in  early  youth,  to 
glory  in  our  knowledge  of  the  spheroidicity  of  the  earth, 
and  feel  vastly  superior  to  the  poor  ignoramuses  who 
lived  before  Columbus.  For  all  practical  purposes,  the 
world  is,  for  the  most  of  us,  flat,  and  we  live  in  still  green 
spaces  of  it  beneath  a  moving  sun.  But  out  here  on  this 
great  arc  of  waters,  circled  by  the  horizon  and  spanned 
by  the  swift  sky,  some  glimmering  sense  of  being  on  a 
great  sphere  swinging  through  space  did  come  daily  to 
my  mind,  and  touch  me  with  awe  and  a  sense  of  illimit- 
able grandeur.  Often,  too,  I  would  speculate  on  the 
meaning  of  this  tremendous  sea.  Were  those  astron- 
omers right  who  say  that  it  is  the  hole  left  in  the  cooling 
earth  when  the  moon  flew  off  into  space,  and  took  to 
a  career  of  her  own?  I  never  saw  the  moon  lift  her 
bright  head  over  the  waters  and  walk  up  the  heavens, 
serene  and  innocent,  without  wondering  whether  she  was 
really  a  run-away  from  earth,  who  had  slipped  like  a 
woman  beneath  the  yoke  of  home,  and  chosen  all  space 


Through  the  rain  we  saw  straw  raincoats  like  animated  hay- 
stacks, and  paper  umbrellas  like  gaudy  flowers 


The  half-derisive  welcome  of  the  populace  seemed  the  essence 

of  courtesy 


E.  M.  Newman 


It  was  a  delicate  sea  upon  which  we  were  launched — a   sea 
without  substance  or  tangible  reality 


PRELIMINARIES  xxi 

as  her  portion.  I  would  think,  too,  of  lauds  the  Pacific 
washes  through  a  length  of  ten  thousand  miles  from  the 
icebergs  of  the  Arctic  to  the  snowy  cliffs  of  the  Ant- 
arctic continent,  and  the  thousands  and  thousands  of 
islands  that  rest  in  its  arms.  How  vast  a  world  of 
waters  it  is,  how  virgin  and  reticent  still,  hiding  the  lives 
of  its  peoples  away  in  its  shining  recesses,  and  holding 
them  serene  and  apart  from  the  strife  of  those  lands  that 
publish  themselves  as  the  world.  Yet  some  day  perhaps 
the  Pacific  may  still  be  what  the  Mediterranean  was  in 
antiquity  and  the  Atlantic  in  recent  centuries — the 
centre  and  heart  of  the  world,  the  watery  plaza,  as  it 
were,  on  which  all  public  life  of  the  nations  opens. 

The  remaining  eight  days  of  the  voyage  passed  swiftly, 
in  the  bland  content  of  the  sea.  I  don't  remember  what 
I  did  with  them — wasted  them,  most  likely.  I  only  re- 
call that  I  learned  ship  tennis  under  the  tutelage  of 
some  soft-spoken,  homelike  English  folk  attached  to  the 
party  of  Lady  Brandon,  and  that  Brother  Barnes  tem- 
porarily diverted  his  attention  from  the  matrimonial 
future  of  Dorothy  and  me  to  the  conjugal  happiness  of 
the  Bishop.  This  he  would  celebrate  in  delicate  little 
public  eulogiums. 

We  were  beginning  to  tease  the  Captain  to  tell  us  the 
exact  day  of  landing,  and  to  get  just  about  as  much 
satisfaction  as  such  inquiries  deserve,  especially  in  war- 
times. One  afternoon  the  soft  hills  and  valleys  of  water 
over  which  the  ship  would  swing  so  gracefully  seemed 
to  become  mountain  peaks  and  unfathomable  abysses, 
and  the  waves  swept  upward  as  if  to  wash  the  edge  of 
the  low  red  sun.  All  night  the  ship  shivered  and  tossed 
and  groaned,  but  with  dawn  came  peace  like  a  quiet 
hand  upon  the  waters.  All  day  long  we  slipped  over  a 
dim,  blue  summer  sea,  haunted  and  teased  by  the  unseen 


XX11 


presence  of  land.  And,  as  night  fell  in  grey  mist  upon 
the  water,  we  thought  we  saw  casual  lights  and  some- 
times a  far,  ghostly  glow.  Next  morning  we  awoke  in 
the  harbour  of  Yokohama. 


II 


It  is  well  not  to  believe  all  one  hears  about  Japan.  It 
is  still  better  not  to  believe  all  one  sees.  For,  if  you 
come  to  Japan  as  a  well-meaning  stranger,  unsophisti- 
cated in  the  ways  of  this  flowery  empire,  without  warn- 
ing from  California  or  China,  you  will  be  for  some 
months  under  enchantment,  and  will,  no  doubt,  say 
things  which  will  furnish  the  Japan  Chronicle  with  food 
for  editorial  mirth  for  a  week.  So  have  we  all  done 
in  our  time.  Lafcadio  Hearn  started  the  fashion,  and 
every  one  since,  from  bankers  to  debutantes,  has  been 
in  the  mode.  No  doubt  there  was  a  time  when  such 
rapture  was  harmless — was  even,  perhaps,  a  salutary 
shock  to  the  self-complacent  West.  But  that  time  has 
now  gone  by.  The  most  innocent  taste  for  cherry- 
blossoms  carries  bitterness  into  the  heart  of  Cathay, 
and  mockery  to  all  the  shores  of  the  Pacific. 

Yet  surely  it  is  not  all  "propaganda"— that  charm 
which  addles  the  wits  of  the  guest  in  Nippon.  There 
is  illusion  in  the  very  atmosphere  of  Japan,  a  conspiracy 
of  earth  and  sky  and  water  to  flatter  the  eye  and  turn 
it  from  unseemly  things.  Seen  through  a  flash  of  rain, 
a  mist  in  the  morning,  a  sunshine  which  is  like  fine  dust 
in  the  eyes,  the  solid  land  melts  into  the  stuff  that 
dreams  are  made  of,  becomes  a  world  of  shadow,  and 
silhouette,  and  casual  flame.  There  is  illusion,  too,  in 
the  mere  accident  of  the  physical  littleness  of  the  people, 
reducing  human  actions  to  elfin  proportions,  subtly  dis- 


PRELIMINARIES  xxiii 

counting  and  idealizing  them  in  the  eyes  of  men  to  whom 
Nature  gave  weight  and  inches,  as  one  discounts  and 
idealizes  the  doings  of  children.  There  is  illusion,  too, 
in  the  daily  and  common  use  of  things  dedicated  in  our 
minds  to  intimate,  festive,  or  esoteric  functions.  A 
kimono,  a  wandering  paper  lantern  by  night,  a  bronze 
Buddha  in  a  forest  place,  will  transform  the  familiar 
emotions  of  common  humanity,  and  give  to  the  most 
prosaic  events  the  colours  of  the  footlights. 

For  myself,  I  confess  that  I  never  wholly  recovered 
from  this  enchantment.  The  first  brief  glimpse  between 
Yokohama  and  Nagasaki,  en  route  to  Shanghai,  was 
lovely  with  the  light  of  blossoms  and  the  tenderest  spring 
sunshine.  Even  when  I  returned  from  China  for  a 
longer  sojourn,  with  a  thousand  accusations  ringing  in 
my  ears  and  memories  of  dusty  grandeur  which  nothing 
Japanese  can  rival,  I  seemed  to  walk  back  into  fairy- 
land. And  when,  in  the  late  summer,  I  climbed 
Fujiyama  by  night  and  saw  the  dawn  from  its  summit, 
I  climbed  into  the  heart  of  a  dream  and  carried  away 
the  hope  and  the  vision  which  come,  perhaps,  only  once 
in  a  life-time.  Though  the  author  of  Japan:  Real  and 
Imaginary  now  assures  me  that  my  Japan  is  mostly 
imaginary,  his  own  part  in  that  great  deception  is  now, 
I  suppose,  sufficiently  obvious  to  all  the  world. 

Be  that  as  it  may,  certainly  on  that  first  morning  in 
the  harbour  of  Yokohama,  Japan  emerged  delicately 
from  the  seas.  The  rain  was  falling  in  what  seemed 
more  a  downpour  of  mist  than  water,  and  through  it  I 
saw  a  terraced  green  landscape,  and  people  in  straw 
raincoats  who  moved  like  animated  haystacks,  and 
paper  umbrellas  of  red  and  blue  and  yellow  which 
bloomed  out  of  the  rain  like  great  gaudy  flowers.  Yet 
so  remote  and  quiet  was  it  all  behind  that  veil  of  falling 


xxiv  PRELIMINARIES 

water,  that  the  little  yellow  men  in  brass-coloured  rain- 
coats who  stepped  out  of  the  rain,  glittering  and  drip- 
ping, to  inquire  about  our  ancestors  and  question  our 
right  to  enter  Japan,  seemed  to  come  from  some  dim 
void  and  to  have  no  earthly  place  and  habitation.  So 
before  I  had  rightly  recovered  from  the  long  dream  of 
the  sea,  I  awoke  to  find  myself  in  a  rickshaw  drawn  by  a 
lively  little  fellow  in  a  great  bowl-shaped  hat,  who 
moved  as  if  his  feet  were  made  of  rubber. 

The  rain  had  ceased  now  and  all  the  land  was  steam- 
ing. I  looked  around  me  with  delight.  Though  Yoko- 
hama is  only  a  hybrid  city,  no  less  Occidental  than  Ori- 
ental, and  draws  its  life  rather  from  the  great  ships 
that  call  here  than  from  any  native  energy,  my  eye 
readily  discounted  its  western  buildings  and  small  pre- 
tentious shops  to  rest  with  pleasure  upon  some  little  grey 
house  with  its  tiny  rocky  garden,  and  small  twisted 
trees,  or  a  rosy  blur  of  cherry  blossoms,  or  a  red  (maple 
that  burned  in  the  mist.  A  group  of  girls  with  archi- 
tectural coiffures  stopped  to  point  at  us,  and  titter  at 
our  complexions  and  costumes.  A  band  of  schoolboys 
in  speckled  kimonos,  rosy  and  smiling,  paused  in  our 
path,  and,  moved  by  some  inexplicable  impulse,  saluted 
all  together,  awkwardly  like  mechanical  dolls.  True, 
the  cherry  blossoms,  clinging  wetly  to  their  coarse  brown 
twigs,  looked  like  pink  tulle  costumes  of  ballet  girls 
caught  in  the  rain,  and  the  children,  as  Dorothy  said, 
had  "most  awful  rummy  noses" ;  but  I  had  come  to  be 
delighted,  and  delighted  I  was.  The  half  derisive  wel- 
come of  the  populace  had  to  my  ignorance  the  very 
essence  of  courtesy;  and  when  out  of  the  fogs  crept 
a  little  green  trolley  car  and  ambled  down  the  street, 
it  was  as  marvellous  in  that  setting  as  a  green  dragon 
with  purple  eyes. 


PRELIMINARIES  xxv 

At  Yokohama  the  great  steamers  commonly  deposit 
their  passengers  for  an  overland  jaunt,  and  pick  them 
up  on  the  opposite  coast,  at  Kobe  or  Nagasaki.  So, 
though  our  immediate  destination  was  Shanghai,  and 
we  were  not  to  see  Japan  in  detail  till  we  had  traversed 
China  from  Foochow  to  Peking,  the  next  two  days  were 
spent  in  an  overland  flight  from  Yokohama  to  Kobe. 
For  hours  we  slipped  over  the  rice  fields,  which  make  so 
quaint  a  patterning  upon  the  terraced  hills,  resembling 
brocade  as  our  rectangular  fields  resemble  patch-work. 
And  the  little  grey  houses  embowered  in  trees  and  some- 
times cherishing  whole  gardens  among  the  thatch  on 
their  roofs,  and  the  kiddies  in  kimonos  of  scarlet  and 
yellow,  and  the  girls  beneath  their  parasols,  and  the  boys 
in  the  streams  waist  high,  angling  for  eels,  and  the 
twinkling  gold  of  the  mustard  fields,  and  spring-time 
blossoming  of  plum  and  cherry  were  all  at  that  time 
the  authentic  stuff  of  romance.  After  some  hours  we 
came  out  into  wilder  country,  where  we  whirled  in  and 
out  of  smoky  tunnels,  and  dashed  across  bridges  that 
spanned  plunging  streams  and  flowery  gorges,  while  all 
around  us  the  mountains  formed  and  melted  in  the  sky 
like  clouds.  Then  Fujiyama  emerged — a  delicate,  ma- 
jestic, and  lonely  form.  And,  seeing  how  it  stands  with 
no  clutter  of  foothills  around  its  base,  no  confusion  and 
rivalry  of  lesser  peaks,  a  sheer  ascent  from  sea  to  sky, 
I  thought  I  had  never  seen  a  mountain  so  beautiful — for 
it  was  even  more  beautiful  in  my  eyes  than  the  mightier 
cone  of  Popocatapetl  or  the  starry  heights  of  Orizaba. 
So  I  thought  then,  but  I  did  not  know  that  one  day 
it  would  mean  something  more  to  me  than  beauty,  and 
all  the  memories  of  this  casual  journey  around  the 
world,  and  perhaps  even  of  my  life  itself,  would  focus 
in  the  dawn  upon  its  summit. 


xxvi  PRELIMINARIES 

All  afternoon  we  slipped  along  the  sea,  where  the 
crooked  pine  trees  were  silhouetted  dark  against  the 
silvery  light,  and  the  little  boats  played  upon  the  water 
like  birds.  Kyoto  passed  in  a  galaxy  of  lights  at  sun- 
Bet,  without  prophecy  of  the  days  when  it  would  be, 
for  a  time,  my  home,  and  in  the  darkness  we  were 
dropped  in  Kobe.  Next  day  we  were  out  again  upon 
the  waters  bound  for  the  shores  of  China  by  way  of  the 
Inland  Sea. 

It  was  a  delicate  sea  on  which  we  were  launched,  a 
sea  without  substance  or  tangible  reality,  where  the 
islands  seemed  but  drifts  of  cloud,  and  the  waters  were 
liquid  light  and  moving  shadow.    Over  it  all  shimmered 
the  infinite  tender  blue  which,  in  this  atmosphere  of 
misty  Japan,  is  neither  veritable  sky  nor  pure  light. 
It  is  only  a  kind  of  disembodied  soul  of  light,  the  ghost 
and  lovely  memory  of  what  elsewhere  is  real.     So  we 
sailed  on  and  on,  lost  in  dreams  and  shining  appear- 
ances.   And  when  darkness  drifted  to  us  over  the  quiet 
waters,  and  all  the  waves  were  alight  with  little  red 
fires  on  island  shores,  or  signals  of  shadowy  sampans 
adrift  in  the  night,  some  reservoir  of  tender  and  mel- 
ancholy sentiment  seemed  to  open  in  every  heart  on 
board.      All    over   the   decks   there    were    whispering 
couples,  and  the  lights  gleamed  wanly  on  interlocked 
hands.     I  walked  around  the  deck  with  Dorothy,  who 
was  moved  by  the  starlight  and  the  pensive  dark  to  tell 
me  what  she  thought  of  "love."    She  didn't  think  much 
of  it,  unless  it  was  "free  love" — the  precocious  infant ! — 
at  which  point  the  discussion  was  suddenly  ended  by 
the  voice  of  the  Bishop  speaking  to  us  from  the  shadows. 

"Dorothy,"  he  said,  "you  are  a  nut." 

But  the  Bishop  himself  did  not  escape  the  infection. 
We  came  upon  him  later  standing  by  the  rail.     His 


PRELIMINARIES  xxvii 

arm  was  around  Lady's  waist,  and,  as  she  tried  to  draw 
away,  afraid,  apparently,  of  public  notice,  he  was  saying 
in  teasing  accents :  "But  don't  you  know,  dear,  you  are 
just  like  the  Devil  in  the  old  hymn,  tempting,  luring, 
goading  into  sin." 

Just  then  there  was  the  rush  of  an  oncoming  pres- 
ence in  the  darkness,  and  a  great  mass  of  humanity  bore 
down  upon  them,  booming.  "Well,  well,  well,"  cried 
Brother  Barnes.  "Sweethearts  still !  Now  I  call  that 
beautiful." 

At  Nagasaki  an  army  of  sturdy  girl  coal-heavers 
stoked  our  ship,  passing  the  baskets  of  coal  from  hand 
to  hand  like  buckets  of  water  in  the  old-fashioned  fire- 
drill.  Thus  provisioned,  we  steamed  out  again  into  the 
sunset,  and  awoke  on  the  dull  waters  of  the  Yellow  Sea. 
It  is  strange  that  seas,  too,  have  their  physiognomy  of 
homeliness  or  grace,  and  when  one  exchanges  the  waters 
along  the  Japanese  coasts  for  the  sea  that  is  the  vesti- 
bule of  China,  it  is  like  exchanging  the  society  of  a 
capricious,  pretty  girl  for  a  drab  house-wife.  The  waters 
are  muddy  and  yellow,  and  they  move  heavily  and  dis- 
colour all  reflection  of  light.  The  skies  hang  low,  and, 
at  the  moment  of  our  passing,  were  of  a  uniform  sullen 
grey,  quite  different  from  the  sun-pierced  April  mists 
of  the  shores  we  had  just  left  behind. 

Two  days  across  the  Yellow  Sea  brought  us  within 
sight  of  the  low  green  shores  of  China  on  Sunday  morn- 
ing. They  were  blotted  with  rain,  and  against  the 
marshy  green  the  waves  were  breaking  in  thick,  ugly 
foam.  Here  we  abandoned  the  ship,  and  sped  up  the 
Yangtse  in  a  launch.  As  we  entered  the  mouth  of  the 
river,  I  felt,  with  a  home-sick  start,  that  this  was  not 
China  at  all,  but  some  enterprising  town  washed  by  the 
pale  floods  of  the  Mississippi;  for  I  saw  only  the  bare 


xxviii  PRELIMINARIES 

red  walls  of  Shanghai  ware-houses,  and  the  spire  of  a 
Christian  church.  Where  were  the  curly  roofs  and 
demon  haunts  of  China?  Some  junks  passed  us  on  the 
river.  They  had  odd,  weather-beaten  sails  of  straw,  and 
were  painted  with  eyes  whose  unwinking  watch  might 
scare  away  the  devils.  They  were  reassuring. 

As  we  drew  nearer  to  Shanghai,  the  fact  that  this  was 
an  alien  land  was  borne  in  upon  me  with  a  certain 
sinister  implication.  On  the  Bund  I  saw  soldiers  in 
khaki  drilling. 

"They  are  British  and  American  volunteers,  who  are 
prepared  to  defend  the  foreign  concessions  in  case  of 
an  uprising  among  the  Chinese,"  said  the  Bishop. 

Drawing  near  to  the  dock,  I  distinguished,  among  the 
ragamuffin  hordes  waiting  to  apply  for  jobs  as  coolies, 
certain  great  and  stately  figures,  in  dark  blue  uniforms 
and  huge  red  turbans.  They  are  the  Sikh  police  im- 
ported from  India  by  the  British  to  guard  the  white  men. 
Noble  looking  creatures  they  are — six  feet  tall,  and 
proud  of  mien,  with  regular  black  features — and  they 
bear  themselves  like  Sultans. 

Looking  out  upon  them,  through  the  hub-bub  and  the 
down-pour  of  landing,  the  one  thing  to  delight  the  eye 
on  all  those  ugly  docks,  I  remarked  to  Dorothy,  "That 
reminds  me— I  am  going  to  India  before  I  see  New 
York  again!" 

Dorothy  received  this  announcement  calmly.  "Good 
luck  to  you,  my  dear.  I  may  go  with  you." 

At  that  time  all  this  was  wildest  fancy.  Our  return 
passage  was  already  engaged  for  September,  from  one 
of  the  ports  of  Japan. 

"Might  be  your  honey-moon,"  added  Dorothy. 
While  she  was  elaborating  this  roseate  theme,  we  were 
suddenly   dumped   upon   the   roaring,   dirty   docks   of 


PRELIMINARIES  xxix 

Shanghai  in  the  cold,  blinding  rain.  That  landing  was 
the  negation  of  all  dreams  of  the  Orient.  There  was 
neither  colour,  charm,  nor  interest — only  great  ugly  red 
brick  buildings,  an  uproar  of  uncouth  voices,  and  a 
concentrated  essence  of  evil  smells.  While  we  wrere 
struggling  through  the  Customs  with  our  baggage,  I 
heard  a  little  conversation  between  the  Bishop  and 
Brother  Barnes.  The  Bishop  had  put  upon  the  good 
brother  a  fair  share  of  the  details  of  landing.  Brother 
Barnes  demurred;  he  fidgeted;  he  looked  at  his  watch. 
Finally  he  suggested,  "Bishop,  have  you  noticed  that  it 
is  half -past  ten?" 

"Yes,"  said  the  Bishop. 

Dead  silence.  Brother  Barnes  spoke  again,  with  the 
air  of  one  supported  through  an  unpopular  perform- 
ance by  a  good  conscience. 

"It  is  time  for  divine  service,  Bishop." 

"Yes,"  said  the  Bishop. 

"I  think  I  must  be  excused,  Bishop.  It  is  something 
I  never  miss." 

"Business  before  pleasure,  Brother  Barnes,"  said  the 
Bishop  coolly,  proceeding  with  the  details  of  landing. 

As  we  rode  off  in  battered  rickshaws  drawn  by  dirty, 
ragged,  howling  coolies,  Shanghai  seemed  a  nondescript 
town,  scarcely  more  Chinese  than  San  Francisco,  for  it 
is  a  British  city  owned,  inhabited,  and  governed  by 
British,  with  some  American  and  French  co-operation. 
Under  the  deluge  of  rain,  its  solid  grey  houses,  trimmed 
in  red  brick,  looked  cold  and  dismal. 

Sitting  disconsolately  in  a  dank  and  mildewed  room, 
furnished  with  a  hair-cloth  sofa,  a  marble-topped  table, 
and  Webster's  Dictionary  and  the  Holy  Bible  in  a  glass 
book-case,  we  told  the  Bishop  what  we  thought  of  the 
Orient.  He  explained  that  we  had  not  yet  seen  China. 


xxx  PKELIMINAKIES 

In  the  days  wlieii  Shanghai  was  China,  it  was  only  a 
collection  of  fishing  huts,  beside  the  Whangpo  Kiver. 
But  the  British  saw  what  a  place  it  might  be  for  the 
meeting  of  the  great  ships  they  planned  to  set  afloat  on 
these  seas,  and  so  they  had  acquired  the  land  and  built 
upon  it,  till  it  was  now  the  great  commercial  metropolis 
of  the  East,  a  place  of  docks  and  ware-houses,  and  brick 
walls  and  shaded  avenues  of  residence  which  we  had  not 
yet  seen. 

To  this  exposition  Dorothy  listened  in  gloomy  silence. 
"Well,  Dad,"  she  said.  "If  there  is  a  real  China,  lead 
us  to  it." 

"I  will,"  said  the  Bishop,  and  the  manner  and  goal 
of  the  leading  is  shown  forth  in  the  pages  that  follow. 


CHAPTER 
I 

II 
III 

IV 

V 

VI 

VII 

VIII 

IX 

X 

XI 

XII 

XIII 

XIV 

XV 

XVI 

XVII 

XVIII 

XIX 

XX 

XXI 

XXII 

XXIII 


CONTENTS 

GOING  DOWN  THE  PIRATE  COAST 
I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER 
HAVOC  AMONG  THE  ANCESTORS  . 
A  Pious  INTERLUDE      .... 
THE  HERITAGE  OF  NOAH 
THE  GHOST  OF  THE  TEMPLE 
INFANT  CASUALTIES      .... 
A  GORY  CONCLUSION     .... 
AN  ALUMNAE  EEUNION 
CINDERELLA  OF  THE  BAMBOOS 

OUTLAW  BRIDES 

HEART'S  BITTERNESS     .... 
His  AMERICAN  MARRIAGE     . 
THE  KESCUE  OF  LITTLE  MUM 
THE  COURTS  OF  KUBLA  KHAN     . 
THE  CHAPERONAGE  OF  JACOB  WANG  . 
"MADAME,  I  AM  A  DETECTIVE"    . 
PRINCE  AND  PAUPER     .... 
A  CHAPTER  OF  LOVE-AFFAIRS 

THE  GOLD-DIGGER 

THE  BISHOP  TAKES  A  HOLIDAY  . 
THE  GION  MATSURI      .... 
FOOTPATHS   IN   THE   SACRED   MOUN- 
TAINS     

AN  UNINVITED  GUEST  OF  THE  MIKADO 
PILGRIMS  AMONG  THE  STARS 
A  PERSONAL  EPILOGUE 


PAGE 

3 

i4 

28 

34 

39 

48 

54 

GO 

69 

80 

80 

99 

108 

116 

126 

141 

147 

153 

158 

165 

172 

179 

185 
193 
206 
212 


XXX11 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTEB 

XXVII 
XXVIII 


XXIX 

XXX 

XXXI 

XXXII 

XXXIII 

XXXIV 

XXXV 

XXXVI 

XXXVII 

XXXVIII 

XXXIX 

XL 

XLI 

XLII 

XLIII 

XLIV 

XLV 

XLVI 

XLVII 

XLVIII 

XLIX 

L 

LI 
LII 


PERCY,  THE  PLUTOCRAT 

THE  M.  D.  DIVISION  OF  THE  BUREAU 

OF  LABOR     

BACK  TO  THE  PRIMITIVE 
EX-HEAD-HUNTERS        .... 

THE  PYGMIES 

AT  THE  THRESHOLD  OF  INDIA 
THE  KUBBER  KING        .... 
ON  THE  ROAD  TO  MANDALAY 
WHERE  EVE  Is  THE  GENTLEMAN 

CARUSO 

PEACE      .... 
LADIES  OF  THE  ZENANA 

A  GUEST  OF  TAGORE  AT  SHANTINIKE- 

TAN      .... 
CHOTA  HAZRI 
UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TREE 
THE  LOTUS  OF  THE  WORLD  . 
MEMORIALS  OF  OLD  BLOODSHED 
THE  LAND  OF  THE  GREAT  MOGUL 
OLD  LOVE  AND  MODERN  COMEDY  . 
LADDIE 
SUSPENSE 
SCANDALS 
AT  THE  GATES  OF  THE  FAR  EAST 

"PEACE  ON  EARTH;  GOOD  WILL  TO 

MEN"   . 

THE  ROAD  TO  THE  ALHAMBRA 
SHIPWRECKED 


PAGE 

217 


230 
235 
240 
244 
249 
255 
260 
267 
275 
287 
294 

300 

312 

317 

332 

338 

348 

359 

369 

376 

381 

392 

400 
410 
416 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

The  harbour  of  Vancouver  on  an  afternoon  betwixt  winter  and 

spring Frontispiece 

PAGE 

Through  the  rain  we  saw  straw  raincoats  like  animated  hay- 
stacks, and  paper  umbrellas  like  gaudy  flowers  xx 
The  half -derisive  welcome  of  the  populace  seemed  the  essence 

of  courtesy xx 

It  was  a  delicate  sea  upon  which  we  were  launched — a  sea 

without  substance  or  tangible  reality xxi 

A  frowsy  lot  they  were — all  except  the  women  ....  18 
"Must  be  a  strange  land,"  said  a  vivacious  young  thing,  "where 

women  wear  skirts" 18 

"Is   she   married?"   I   wondered,   looking   at   a   lovely,   satiny 

yellow  face 19 

These,  it  seemed,  were  evidences  of  her  husband's  love       .        .       19 
The  ancestors  were  not  having  it  all  their  own  way  ...       30 
Thither,  by  all  the  paths  of  the  rice  fields,  the  people  were  run- 
ning        

The  tiny  tots  basked,  like  kittens,  in  the  sunshine  of  the  mission 
So  the  Bishop  went  his  way,  distributing  his  simple  gift  of 

peace  even  in  the  red  courts  of  Confucian  temples  .        .       31 

Inn-yard,  Peking 4(5 

Avenue  leading  to  Ming  Tombs 47 

The  mother  of  the  bulbous  babe  indicated  that  there  was  a  sub- 
ject worthy  of  my  camera 82 

She  seemed  to  remember  that  life  was  not  always  like  this  .  82 
Patrician  girls  learned  English  and  foreign  manners  through 

the  medium  of  Shakespeare 83 

The  slum  children  looked  upon  the  fair  mandarin  daughters 

with  unconscious  cynicism 83 

Tea-gardens,  Soo-Chow "  .  .  .  104 

The  last  great  drama  of  the  Empire  is  not  yet  played  out  .  .  105 
It  seemed  scarcely  credible  that,  out  of  that  legendary  past,  a 

living  princess  could  step  into  one's  presence  .  .  .  128 
A  pretty  young  woman,  vivacious  and  chic,  and  very  much  a 

creature  of  these  times .  .  128 

In  the  sunshine  that  falls  so  quietly  among  the  old  ducal  courts 

of  the  British  legation,  there  is  no  memory  of  smoke  and 

fire 129 

zxxiii 


xxxiv  ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

The  Temple  of  Heaven,  Peking 144 

Hoang  Lu  Gate,  Temple  of  Confucius,  Peking  ....     144 

A  suburb  of  Seoul,  City  Gate  in  distance 145 

Korean  Court  dancing  girl  and  servant 145 

Typical  old  Korean  swell 145 

From  hill  to  hill  we  travelled  and  from  sacred  grove  to  sacred 

grove 176 

The  festival  begins  with  the  annual  debut  of  the  God  in  human 

society 176 

The  temporal  and  spatial  location  of  the  main  pageant  re- 
mained a  mystery 177 

How  girls  read  and  study 186 

It  was  a  day  of  mists  which  soon  gave  place  to  warm  rain       .     187 
In  honor  of  the  young  princes  the  population  had  turned  out  to 

clean  up  the  road 187 

A  small  boy,  under  an  orange-coloured  umbrella,  began  to  sing, 

"Nearer,  my  God,  to  Thee" 194 

Small,  impassive  faces  filled  up  the  space  beyond  the  platform    194 
I  stepped  off  into  the  ancient  and  mossy  peace  of  Nara  .        .     195 
The  sweetest  inhabitants  of  Nara  are  the  wild  deer  .        .  195 
Beneath   the  towering  branches  that   make   so   rich   a   gloom 
against  the  sun,  blazes  the  scarlet  temple  where  a  Shinto 
priestess  will  dance     .        .        .        .                                             200 
Many  gods  and  ghosts  there  are  who  call  this  home     .                     200 
There  was  not  the  sombre  magnificence  of  the  Buddhist  in- 
teriors     

Fabulous  tales  of  the  ways  of  the  white  man  in  the  presence 

ot  a  lady  had  gone  abroad  ....  208 

There  was  not  one  who  would  miss  a  good  chance  for  observa- 

tlon 208 

Fujiyama  reflected  in  Lake  Hakone       ...  209 

In  tIJL?ritish  leSat[°Yn  Peking  the  scars  of  the  Boxer  up- 

smg  are  now  healed  with  grass  and  flowers  932 

ieS^ltllbrOWn  W°men  had  the  ^ace  «ri  naturalness  of  wild 

232 

the 


201 


n    sa  eo 

"  a  <«nguished  'isto'ry  as 

The  Igorrotes  have  an  unseemly  habit  of  dining  on  dogs  .'  w 


. 
A  naked  little  jungle  boy  emerged  and  said  "Hello"  ' 

"  SS  ^  ablC  tribe  ^  a  <«nguished  'isto'ry  as 


ILLUSTRATIONS  xxxv 

PAGE 

She  was  enjoying  her  first  lesson  in  co-education  .  .  .  247 
Out  of  the  jungle  lean-to  swarmed  the  pygmy  people  .  .  252 
There  were  miniature  mothers  and  the  tiniest  babes  1  ever  saw  252 
I  made  some  research  into  social  conditions  in  the  cosmopolitan 

community  of  Singapore 253 

We  kept  passing  majestic,  turbaned  figures,  like  ghosts  out  of 

some  old  Bible 253 

I  ascended  through  the  golden  gates  into  the  heart  of  that  tem- 
pled world 2G4 

The  carved  and  gilded  shrines  were  delicate  as  lace  embroidered 

with  gems 204 

The  bronze  monks  walked  by  twos  and  threes  within  the  temple 

courts 265 

Amidst  the  flowers  and  candles  of  the  pagoda,  he  caught  the 

flirtatious  glance  of  a  dainty,  saffron  maid  ....     265 

She  had  heard  the  manlike  wisdom  and  witnessed  the  manlike 

freedom  of  the  genuinely  Christian  girls  ....  296 
Only  an  Anglo-Saxon  people  could  make  such  an  ugly  city  .  297 
Fresh  and  home-like  they  seemed  to  us,  those  bright  harvest 

fields 340 

This  agricultural  efficiency  was  to  us  the  most  interesting  thing 

about  Allahabad 340 

The  Palace  of  the  Peacock  Throne  at  Delhi 341 

We  climbed  one  of  the  minarets  and  saw  the  city  spread  out 

before  us  like  a  map 350 

Street  scene  in  Delhi 351 

Standing  so  delicate  and  white  against  the  blazing  blue  of  the 

sky 364 

Afterward  we  wandered  through  the  palaces  where  that  queen 

had  lived 365 

The  solemn  figure  of  the  Bedouin  lifts  up  his  hands  in  prayer 

to  Allah 406 

Once  it  was  a  granary  of  the  Roman  Empire  ....  407 
A  town  decorated  by  a  river  that  coiled  and  sparkled  like  a 

silver  ribbon  dropped  from  on  high 412 

The  land  bore  about  it  an  indescribable  air  of  melancholy 

romance  .        .        .  413 


,   \ 


BOOK  ONE 


IN  THE  EYES  OF 
THE  EAST 

CHAPTER  I 

GOING  DOWN  THE  PIRATE  COAST 

THE  imagination  of  youth  has  a  predilection  for  rogues 
of  one  sort  or  another.  Talk  of  a  pirate  or  a  bandit,  and 
where  is  there  a  good  red-blooded  imagination  under 
forty-five  that  won't  thrill?  So  it  happened  that,  when 
the  Bishop  proposed  that  we  make  our  real  d£but  in 
China,  by  way  of  Foochow,  some  hundreds  of  miles  south 
of  Shanghai  on  the  China  coast,  our  imagination  immedi- 
ately responded  with  joyous  memories  of  the  whole 
literature  of  roguery.  For  there  were  pirates,  en  route, 
said  Dorothy.  One  might  enjoy  social  intercourse  with 
them  all  up  and  down  the  coast,  and  the  deeds  that  they 
did  were  mostly  deliciously  dark. 

The  Bishop,  however,  was  sceptical.  His  mind  dwelt 
on  more  prosaic  horrors.  "I  can't  positively  promise 
you  a  pirate,"  said  he.  "Won't  a  bandit  or  a  blue  tiger 
do?" 

"Lead  on,  old  dear,"  said  Dorothy.  "But  really,  you 
know,  we  do  prefer  pirates." 

"I  suppose  I  ought  not  to  take  you,"  continued  the 
Bishop  thoughtfully.  "There's  a  kind  of  revolution  in 
South  China.  They  won't  accept  the  Peking  govern- 
ment, you  know,  and  express  their  feelings  every  now 
and  then  by  shooting." 

3 


4  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Dorothy's  eyes  sparkled.  "Oh,  Marjorie's  revolution 
proof.  She's  lived  in  Mexico.  And  if  we  can't  be  cap- 
tured by  a  pirate,  I  should  think  a  revolution  would  be 
a  rather  nice  little  show." 

Just  then  the  agent  of  the  South  China  Merchant  line 
was  announced.  He  had  come  to  make  the  last  ar- 
rangements for  our  passage  to  Foochow  on  his  little 
vessel.  As  Dorothy  whirled  me  rapturously  away  to 
make  suitable  preparations  for  our  demise  at  the  hands 
of  the  pirate,  the  Bishop's  voice  trailed  after  us  in  one 
last  word  of  warning: 

"Oh,  yes,  and  there  are  lepers,  you  know." 

The  province  of  Fukien,  which  we  had  picked  out 
for  our  operations,  is  off  the  main  line  of  tourist 
travel.  The  Bishop  was  attracted  thither  by  accounts 
of  a  remarkable  campaign  among  the  villages  conducted 
entirely  by  a  troupe  of  Chinese  evangelists,  and  by  plans 
for  a  great  union  Christian  university  at  Foochow.  But 
few  visitors  to  the  Far  East  find  so  much  reason  to  brave 
the  peculiar  terrors  of  the  China  Sea,  whose  dizzy  yellow 
waters  lie  between  Shanghai  and  Foochow.  The  coasts 
are  lonely,  too,  and  pirates  not  unknown,  though,  to 
passengers  on  the  British  trading  vessels,  they  are 
mostly  matters  for  speculation  rather  than  for  fear.  Yet 
Fukien,  with  its  terraced  hills  and  semi-tropical  valleys, 
is  one  of  the  loveliest  and  most  ancient  provinces  of 
China,  and  the  seat  of  an  enterprising  sea-faring  folk 
who  would  comprise  an  excellent  navy  were  money  in 
China  as  cheap  as  men.  Though,  of  all  the  various  sec- 
tions of  China  which  have  found  favour  in  Japanese 
eyes,  Fukien  is  perhaps  the  most  coveted,  and  has  been 
and  will  probably  be  more  and  more  a  pawn  in  the 
manoauvres  of  the  Far  East,  its  simple  village  life  is  as 
yet  untouched  by  railroads  and  telegraphs  and  post- 


GOING  DOWN  THE  PIRATE  COAST  5 

offices  which  the  ambitious  lords  of  the  Orient  still  hope 
to  bestow  upon  it. 

In  the  direction  of  Fukien  we  set  forth,  with  hardly 
a  preliminary  glance  at  Shanghai — the  Bishop  and  Lady, 
and  Dorothy  and  I.  Brother  Barnes  was  already 
launched  on  a  spree  of  exhortations  and  religious  serv- 
ices, and  was  living  in  a  state  of  holy  rapture.  It  was 
a  little  bark  that  was  to  stand  between  us  and  the 
pirates,  and  it  carried  no  other  white  passengers.  The 
Chinese  in  possession  of  the  best  cabins  were  summarily 
dispossessed  by  the  steward — himself  a  Chinese,  of 
course — on  the  ground  that  we  were  top-side  people, 
and  the  ship  was  at  our  service.  But  we  didn't  take  as 
kindly  to  those  cabins  as  such  attentions  deserved,  and 
mostly  ate  and  slept  on  the  little  deck  aloft,  sheltered 
by  canvas  from  the  light  rains  and  white  sun.  It  was  a 
lonely  trip.  After  the  wide  brown  wastes  of  the  mouth 
of  the  Yangste  had  given  place  to  the  dancing  sea,  we 
saw  not  a  junk  nor  a  sail.  But  sometimes  we  passed  by 
islands  that  were  covered  with  grass  as  with  a  soft  down, 
and  inhabited  by  wild  birds  and  fisher  folk.  Yet  often 
they  were  but  solitary  rocks  that  vibrated  all  day  long 
to  the  beating  of  the  waters. 

As  we  slipped  southward  through  flying  rains  and 
flashes  of  sunshine,  Dorothy  extracted  tales  of  the 
pirates  from  the  British  skipper,  a  weather-beaten  old 
reprobate  who  had  some  difficulty  in  making  a  suitable 
selection  from  his  vocabulary  for  the  benefit  of  ladies 
and  bishops.  Most  of  his  stories  dated  back  some 
decades  to  the  days  when  sailing  vessels  carried  the 
trade  that  now  travels  under  steam,  and  were  a  fair  prey 
to  pirate  junks  which,  to  this  day,  know  nothing  of  coal 
and  engines.  He  told  about  the  gentlemanly  free-booters 
who,  having  robbed  some  Americans,  taking  their  vessel 


C  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

and  all  their  provisions,  invited  their  victims  to  a  good 
breakfast  on  their  own  stores  before  setting  them  adrift 
in  a  tiny  boat.  There  was  another  Chinese  pirate  who 
stole  an  Englishman's  watch,  among  other  things,  and 
later  called  on  him  on  shore  to  find  out  how  to  wind  it. 
But  there  was  also  a  due  proportion  of  drowning  and 
murders  among  the  exploits  of  these  high-handed 
celestials. 

He  also  told  the  story  of  Foochow,  and  why  it  is  tucked 
away  some  thirty  miles  up  the  river  Ming,  instead  of 
being  on  the  sea-coast.  Once  there  was  a  prosperous 
city  on  the  coast,  where  even  now  one  may  see  the  pirate 
beacon  that  warns  land  lubbers  of  robbers  by  sea.  This 
city  the  pirates  attacked  and  invested  for  many  days. 
At  last  the  food  within  the  walls  was  all  eaten, — and 
even  the  animals,  the  water-buffalo,  the  ducks,  and  the 
mangy  dogs.  Nothing  remained  but  a  little  rice. 

Then  some  one  had  a  daring  thought.  He  suggested 
that  they  boil  the  rice  and  throw  it  into  the  ditches, 
which  served  as  open  sewers  for  the  town,  so  that,  when 
the  pirates  should  see  the  boiled  rice  pouring  out  of  the 
city  with  the  rest  of  the  refuse,  they  might  say : 

"How  much  food  these  people  must  have,  if  they  can 
throw  away  rice  like  that!  If  we  are  going  to  wait  till 
we  can  starve  them  out,  we  shall  all  grow  old,  and  die, 
and  become  ancestors,  while  they  continue  to  feast  and 
defy  us.  Let's  look  for  a  hungrier  city,  or  maybe  the 
junk  of  a  rich  merchant  coming  down  from  the  North." 

This  was  a  doubtful  scheme,  but  the  people,  being  at 
their  wits'  ends,  determined  to  try  it.  Sure  enough! 
When  the  pirates  saw  the  rice  flowing  out  of  the  city 
with  the  sewage,  they  put  up  their  quadrangular  sails, 
and  turned  their  curly  prows  out  to  sea,  and  bade  fair 
to  be  seen  no  more. 


GOING  DOWN  THE  PIRATE  COAST  7 

Then  there  was  great  rejoicing.  All  the  gates  of  the 
city  were  thrown  open,  and  the  people  went  in  a  long 
procession  to  the  scarlet  temple  to  thank  all  the  gods 
and  goddesses  and  the  green-tailed  dragons  for  deliver- 
ing them  from  the  pirates.  Just  at  that  moment,  when 
all  the  deities  were  listening  benignly,  with  that  "please- 
don't-mention-it"  air  that  Chinese  gods  have  when  they 
are  good-natured,  the  pirates  swooped  down  upon  the 
city  again,  rushed  in  at  every  open  gate,  and,  falling  on 
the  worshippers  at  the  feet  of  the  gods,  dyed  the  scarlet 
temple  more  scarlet  still  with  the  blood  of  all  the  kneel- 
ing ones.  Every  one  died  at  the  knees  of  the  gods  that 
dreadful  day,  except  only  the  little  yellow  children,  who 
were  borne  away  to  be  sold  as  slaves.  But  the  golden 
deities  never  stopped  smiling  at  all.  They  continued  to 
look  down  complacently  on  the  corpses  piled  round 
them,  and  their  smile  said  as  plainly  as  before,  "Please 
don't  mention  it." 

So  the  old  skipper  told  the  tale,  not  in  language  so 
literary  perhaps,  but  with  all  the  touches  of  drama  and 
colour;  for  he  didn't  have  much  use  for  prayers  of  any 
description,  this  skipper,  and  he  believed,  with  Con- 
fucius, that  the  less  said  about  the  gods  the  better. 

"And  are  there  really  pirates  still?"  asked  Dorothy, 
glancing  out  fearfully  across  the  grey  sea. 

"Sure  thing,"  said  he.  "Same  as  there  ever  was — all 
along  this  coast  and  up  the  rivers,  too.  They  can't  get 
us,  because  we  go  under  steam,  and  they're  just  junks, 
you  know,  with  sails.  But  once  you're  so  foolish  as  to 
go  by  oars  and  canvas,  you'd  better  look  out,  ma'am." 

He  added,  however,  that  when  it  came  to  real  piracy 
none  of  these  Chinks  had  it  on  some  of  his  own  friends — 
enterprising  gentlemen  of  white  skin  and  citizens  of 
New  York  or  London,  whom  he  used  to  know  in  the 


8  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

good  old  days  before  civilization  had  tamed  these  seas. 
They  would  fit  out  a  little  ship  and  start  on  a  gay  career 
around  the  world,  picking  up  the  contents  of  native 
boats  bearing  silks  and  jewels  and  spices,  and  sometimes 
making  away  with  a  rich  little  town  or  two  and  dis- 
tributing all  human  cargo  to  the  fishes.  When  they  were 
well  laden,  they  would  return  to  London  or  New  York, 
sell  the  booty,  and  live  like  gentlemen  to  the  end  of  their 
days.  Among  these  fine  old  sea-dogs,  there  was  one 
Captain  Barstow  from  Providence. 

"Same  name  as  you,  ma'am,"  he  said,  turning  politely 
to  me.  "Probably  a  relative." 

So  we  discoursed  as  the  islands  passed  in  cloudlike 
procession.  But  the  third  day  we  awoke  to  find  the 
ocean  reeling.  Smooth  as  glass  it  seemed,  without  ripple 
or  wave,  but  the  ship  swung  skyward,  too  and  fro  and 
back  and  forth,  as  if  all  the  world  were  rocking.  Still 
and  breathless  the  sunshine  burned  on  the  waters  in  a 
damp,  hot,  noxious  mist  of  light.  Months  later  when  I 
was  shipwrecked  on  the  Atlantic  to  the  tune  of  icy  winds 
about  the  mast,  and  a  roar  of  cold  seas,  I  think  I  suffered 
less  than  I  did  under  this  enchantment  of  heat  and  dizzy 
calm,  this  feverish  delirium  of  water.  Sick  and  help- 
less we  lay  in  our  bunks — all  except  Dorothy.  But 
Dorothy  was  as  impervious  to  sea-sickness  as  she  was  to 
pious  influences.  Clear  and  mocking,  her  laugh  rang 
out. 

"Dorothy,"  said  the  Bishop  feebly  from  the  cabin  next 
to  mine.  "Is  that  you  laughing?" 

"Yes,  Father,"  said  Dorothy. 

"Well,"  said  the  Bishop,  "any  one  who  can  laugh  like 
that  on  Sunday  morning  under  circumstances  like  these 
hasn't  got  any  religion." 

Next  morning  we  awoke  to  a  sweeter  dawn.    Our  ship 


GOING  DOWN  THE  PIRATE  COAST  9 

was  slipping  softly  up  one  of  the  most  beautiful  rivers 
I  have  ever  seen  in  the  shell  pink  light  of  early  morning. 
Beyond  the  waters  on  either  side  were  rocky  shores  and 
sweeps  of  verdant  hillside,  which  cherished  miniature 
villages  and  sometimes  a  pagoda  or  other  winged  struc- 
ture, with  up-curled  aspiring  eaves.  There  was  the 
caress  of  the  tropics  in  the  air,  and  the  luxuriance  of 
tropic  green  upon  the  mountains,  freshened  at  that  hour 
with  the  coolness  of  dew  undried  and  the  breath  of  morn- 
ing winds  that  were  not  yet  saturate  with  sunshine. 
This  was  the  Ming  River,  and  we  were  drawing  near  to 
Foochow,  so  near  in  fact  that  we  could  see  where  it  clung 
in  terraces  to  the  side  of  a  hill.  Ships  like  ours  com- 
monly do  not  dock  .at  Foochow.  They  stop  short  at  a 
place  called  Pagoda  Anchorage,  and  transfer  their 
passengers  to  Chinese  junks,  which  proceed  over  shal- 
lower waters  to  the  city. 

So  at  Pagoda  Anchorage  we  stopped,  and  there  the 
peace  of  the  dawn-lit  morning  departed  with  a  shriek. 
Blue  sampans  rushed  out  from  the  shore  with  howling 
mobs  on  board,  darkening  the  water  and  churning  it 
into  foam,  and  crashing  into  the  ship  in  a  wild  contest 
to  deliver  us  from  our  baggage.  In  the  midst  of  the  con- 
fusion a  brown  and  cheerful  young  missionary  named 
Brace  came  alongside  in  a  house-boat  laden  with  food, 
sedan  chairs,  bedding,  and  coolies.  He  and  his  sun- 
burned friendly  wife  were  going  to  a  village  in  the  in- 
terior of  the  province.  I  offered  myself  as  a  first-class 
passenger.  The  Bishop  gave  me  a  good  recommenda- 
tion, said  I  was  a  respectable  character  and  did  not  mind 
being  captured  by  a  pirate  or  eaten  by  a  tiger,  but  that 
I  drew  the  line  at  dying  of  smallpox.  He  added  that, 
if  I  was  so  unfortunate  as  to  miss  a  romantic  demise, 
he  would  pick  me  up  again  at  Hingwha,  a  city  about 


10  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

eighty  miles  away,  where  there  was  a  flourishing  mis- 
sion. So  I  transferred  myself  to  the  house-boat,  and 
with  some  farewell  instructions  from  Dorothy  about  the 
etiquette  of  social  intercourse  with  pirates,  bandits,  and 
tigers,  we  pushed  off  over  the  twinkling  waters,  into  a 
world  as  strange  and  beautiful  to  me  as  the  sea  of  dew 
on  which  Wynken,  Blynken,  and  Nod  went  adventuring. 

Lightly  our  sails  spread  to  the  wind,  and  the  city 
drifted  from  sight.  Beyond  the  environs  of  Foochow, 
which  is  a  treaty  port,  and  in  which  the  lives  of  for- 
eigners are  under  the  protection  of  their  own  flags  and 
certain  common  means  of  communication  and  defence, 
we  were  outside  of  the  confines  of  settled  law  and  order. 
South  China  had  never  given  allegiance  to  the  govern- 
ment in  Peking,  which  called  itself  republican,  and  a 
kind  of  sporadic  warfare  was  raging  all  up  and  down 
the  country  between  northern  and  southern  soldiers. 
Meanwhile  the  people  shifted  as  best  they  might  under 
local  magistrates  of  one  sort  or  another. 

But  just  as  Satan  can  clothe  himself  as  an  angel  of 
light,  so  anarchy,  I  have  discovered,  can  wear  a  coun- 
tenance of  exquisite  peace.  All  day  long  we  slipped  by 
shores  of  pastoral  quietude,  and  nothing  more  danger- 
ous than  a  man  working  in  a  rice  field  under  a  great 
straw  hat  came  to  disturb  the  hours  of  that  long  shining 
day.  We  drank  afternoon  tea  from  tin-cups  as  we 
waited  for  the  wind  to  return  and  fill  our  sails,  and 
we  saw  the  red  sun  go  down  behind  a  purple  hill.  Then, 
while  the  cook  berated  his  helpers  on  the  after-deck, 
the  odour  of  fried  chicken  mingled  pleasantly  with  the 
cool  breath  of  evening  on  the  waters. 

The  cook,  shifting  smoothly  from  his  after-deck  to  his 
fore-deck  manner,  appeared,  and  meekly  and  suavely 
announced  dinner.  So  we  entered  the  tiny  cabin,  to  eat 


GOING  DOWN  THE  PIKATE  COAST         11 

by  the  light  of  a  smoky  lantern,  and  the  swift  darkness 
of  the  tropics  fell  like  a  curtain  around  us. 

During  dinner  Mr.  Brace  amused  me  with  gossip 
about  a  friend  of  his,  the  Chinese  magistrate  of  these 
parts.  Mr.  Brace  invited  him  to  dinner  every  now  and 
then.  The  magistrate  was  a  benign  person,  who  was  not 
in  the  least  appalled  by  knives  and  forks,  and  affably 
smiled  at  everything.  A  few  weeks  before  there  had  been 
a  revolution  in  the  province,  stirred  up  by  some  despera- 
does who  had  taken  refuge  in  a  Buddhist  monastery. 
The  magistrate  went  forth  clothed  in  his  notion  of  his 
own  authority  and  captured  those  desperadoes.  Then, 
with  his  captives,  he  went  on  a  parade  through  the  prov- 
ince. Every  now  and  then  he  would  cut  off  a  few  heads 
and  present  them  in  passing  to  a  village  as  a  wholesome 
token  of  his  regard.  When  his  captives  were  thus  dis- 
posed of,  he  came  back  to  dine  with  the  missionaries  on 
beefsteak  and  become  once  more  the  perfect  Chinese 
gentleman. 

Just  as  Mr.  Brace  was  promising  to  introduce  me  to 
this  efficient  person,  one  unanimous  thrill  of  horror  went 
down  our  backs,  and  our  smiles  froze  into  a  stare.  Our 
boat  had  stopped.  Against  the  windows  of  our  cabin 
a  dozen  grinning  Chinese  squatted  like  frogs,  their  heads 
pressed  close  to  the  glass.  Beyond  them  the  form 
of  a  sail-boat  loomed  darkly.  At  the  same  moment 
an  official-looking  person  strode  into  our  midst.  "The 
Pirate !"  I  thought.  He  looked  for  all  the  world  like  a 
pirate.  He  had  a  clanking  sword,  high  boots,  a  dia- 
bolical expression,  and  strangely  enough  in  these  days 
of  the  Chinese  republic,  a  pigtail.  He  looked  at  me 
fiercely,  just  as  if  he  were  saying,  "Ha!  What  have  we 
here!"  and  struck  an  attitude,  muttering  strange  oaths. 

"This,"  I  thought  with  a  thrill  half  of  terror  and  half 


12  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  curiosity,  "this  is  the  real  thing.  If  he  doesn't  eat  me 
or  something,  how  much  fun  it  will  be  to  tell  Dorothy 
about  it." 

Meanwhile,  Mr.  Brace  and  the  cook  rose  to  the  occa- 
sion. The  cook,  bowing  in  all  directions,  interpreted  the 
muttering  of  oaths  to  mean  that  this  was  a  police-boat 
sent  by  the  efficient  magistrate  to  patrol  the  river.  He 
wanted  to  know  whether  we  had  any  bad  characters  on 
board.  Mr.  Brace  promptly  adduced  a  Chinese  pass- 
port. I  also  indicated  the  Chinese  inscription  on  the 
back  of  my  passport.  At  these  the  pirate  scowled 
darkly,  and  indicated  that  they  would  never  do.  Then 
he  seized  a  piece  of  paper  and  began  making  signs  upon 
it. 

"A  death-warrant,"  I  thought.  "Why  be  so  formal 
about  it  here  in  the  wilderness?" 

Mr.  Brace's  face  cleared.  "Oh,  I  see"  he  said.  "He 
wants  a  testimonial  from  me  showing  that  he  has  done 
his  duty,  and,  if  I  turn  out  to  be  a  bad  character,  it 
won't  be  his  fault.  He  wants  to  show  it  to  the  magis- 
trate." 

So  he  sat  down  and  wrote  cheerfully  in  English,  be- 
ginning: "Dear  Old  Head-hunter:" 

"Isn't  it  risky  to  be  frivolous  with  a  gentleman  of  his 
disposition?"  I  asked. 

"Oh,  that's  all  right,"  he  said,  scribbling  as  he  talked. 
"There's  a  missionary  who  translates  the  English  for  the 
magistrate.  He  knows  my  style  and  translates  tact- 
fully. This  is  an  honorific  title,  you  know,  and  will 
sound  beautiful  in  Chinese." 

After  a  moment  he  passed  the  note  over  to  me.  "That 
will  do,  I  guess,"  he  said. 

The  note  read  as  follows :  "Dear  Old  Head-hunter : 
Your  police-system  is  certainly  a  whiz.  I'll  recommend  it 


GOING  DOWN  THE  PIRATE  COAST         13 

to  Tammany  when  I  get  borne.  I  don't  know  whether  it 
gets  hold  of  the  bad  characters,  but  I  am  sure  it  captures 
all  the  good  ones.  We  three  who  are  now  in  its  hands 
are  good  ones — I  being  your  knife-and-fork-eating  friend, 
with  my  wife,  who  hasn't  a  grudge  against  anything  at 
all  in  your  province  except  bad  characters,  opium,  and 
smallpox,  and  our  companion  being  a  young  lady  named 
Lovely  Lotus  Flower,  whose  only  intention  is  to  be  eaten 
by  a  tiger  as  soon  as  possible.  We  promise  not  to  rob, 
burn,  kill,  or  otherwise  interfere  with  your  exclusive 
prerogatives." 

This  document  he  signed  with  a  scrawl  which, 
he  averred,  was  the  Chinese  character  for  his  own  name. 
My  private  opinion  is  that  it  was  intended  as  an  alibi, 
in  case  this  document  should  survive  the  normal  fate  of 
a  foreign  tongue,  written  in  a  vile  handwriting,  with  a 
soft  lead  pencil  on  crumpled,  dirty  paper.  Then  he  de- 
livered it,  bowing,  to  the  pirate.  Instantly  the  pirate's 
whole  demeanour  changed.  He  also  bowed,  deeply, 
blandly,  benevolently,  and  marched  happily  away,  while 
all  the  grinning  spectators  at  our  window  vanished  like 
a  chorus  in  a  musical  comedy.  So  ended  my  only  chance 
of  being  captured  by  a  pirate. 

"Since  when  has  my  name  been  Lovely  Lotus  Flower?" 
I  demanded  when  it  was  all  over. 

"Oh,"  he  replied,  indifferently,  "in  China  one  must 
have  a  Chinese  name.  So  I  christened  you." 


CHAPTER  II 

I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER 

OUE  encounter  with  the  law  left  us  a  little  nervous, 
vaguely  afraid  of  we  knew  not  what.  Though  travelling 
in  strange  wildernesses  is  not  bad  by  day,  it  taxes  one's 
courage  by  night.  It  was  an  eerie  journey.  The  hills 
rose  like  gaunt  and  ghostly  giants  around  us;  and,  as 
our  boat  tacked  in  the  wind,  the  shadowy  landscape 
shifted  and  changed  as  if  by  witchcraft.  Even  the  sky 
was  unstable.  Sometimes  a  boat  came  alongside,  trou- 
bling us  vaguely  with  memories  of  pirates.  In  that  shift- 
ing phantasmagoria  of  darkness  all  things  seemed  doubt- 
ful and  sinister. 

Meanwhile,  our  coolies  kept  up  a  harsh  and  unin- 
telligible series  of  yells,  interspersed  with  long  whistles. 
Those  we  half  playfully,  half  fearfully  interpreted  as 
signals  to  bandits  on  shore.  They  were  probably  whis- 
tling for  the  wind.  It  is  supposed  that  the  wayward 
demons  who  inhabit  the  elements  may  be  coaxed  by 
whistling  to  lend  a  little  more  assistance  to  weary 
sailors. 

Toward  midnight  we  entered  a  creek  and  began  to 
row.  Here  the  shores  closed  in  darkly  above  our  heads, 
and  there  were  fearful  shapes  of  rocks,  and  footsteps 
among  the  bushes.  In  this  neighbourhood,  said  Mr. 
Brace,  there  was  a  village  in  which  there  were  no  girl- 
babies.  In  a  land  where  girls  are  unwelcome,  the  waters 
of  the  creek  were  too  fatally  near  the  huddling  houses 
in  which  there  was  not  even  enough  food  for  the  boy- 

14 


I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER  15 

babies.  As  I  heard  this,  the  ghostly  land  became  more 
ghostly.  Were  we  even  now  moving  over  the  bodies  of 
those  little  girls?  Would  their  tiny  white  ghosts  come 
forth  to  sit  on  the  waters  and  wail?  The  frogs  mourned 
in  a  melancholy  chorus,  and  there  was  a  vague  barking 
of  dogs  far  away. 

I  awoke  at  dawn  to  find  the  boat  stranded  in  mud 
which  was  gilded  by  the  light  of  a  solemn  sunrise. 
Nearby  was  a  collection  of  little  mud  houses  that  smelled 
like  a  barnyard.  This  was  the  village  in  which  there 
were  no  girl-babies.  Some  citizens  of  this  misogynistic 
metropolis  were  squatting  at  my  cabin  windows,  taking 
a  good  look  at  the  foreign  lady  while  she  slept.  It  is 
not  easy  for  a  proper  lady  to  make  her  toilet  in  the 
presence  of  a  Chinese  village,  but  there  was  no  help  for 
it.  Philosophically  making  believe  that  they  were  not 
there,  I  proceeded.  Even  when  silent  awe  gave  place  to 
vociferous  wonder  as  I  unbraided  my  yellow  locks  and 
began  to  comb  them  out,  I  maintained  an  air  of  stoical 
indifference  and  a  fine  imitation  of  inward  calm.  A 
sharp  voice  outside  suddenly  called  my  audience  away, 
and  I  was  allowed  to  apply  the  last  hairpin  in  peace. 

The  voice  which  had  thus  delivered  me  belonged  to  as 
strange  a  character  as  I  had  met  in  the  Orient,  one  of 
those  links  between  the  East  and  the  West  which  the 
wandering  British  have  left  here  and  there  in  their 
wake.  She  was  a  squat,  brown  little  woman,  in  a 
Chinese  jacket  and  foreign  skirt,  and  she  spoke  English 
with  a  slight  oddity  of  accent  and  idiom.  Her  father 
had  been  an  English  trader  years  ago,  who  used  to  hunt 
tigers  on  the  hills.  In  the  wilderness  he  had  built  him- 
self a  mansion  to  retire  to,  surrounded  with  trees  and 
roses  and  English  lawns.  Here  his  motherless  daughter, 
"Miss  Lulu,"  had  grown  up  under  the  care  of  an  amah — 


16  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

more  a  little  Chinese  than  an  English  girl.  She  had 
never  seen  the  land  of  her  mother's  and  father's  birth. 
She  lived  among  the  Chinese,  keeping  a  half -matriarchal 
surveillance  over  remote  mountain  hamlets  into  which 
no  white  person  except  herself  ever  came. 

Having  stopped  to  greet  our  boat,  she  was  quite  as 
interested  in  my  blonde  locks  as  were  the  gaping 
Chinese.  She  offered  to  show  me  off  in  the  mountain 
villages  as  a  real  specimen  of  the  Occident,  and,  if  she 
might  become  my  manager  for  such  a  little  tour,  she  said 
she  would  then  despatch  me  to  Hingwha — all  this  with 
the  enthusiasm  of  a  mother  proposing  the  delmt  of  a 
daughter.  Gladly  I  assented. 

So  we  said  good-bye  to  my  missionary  friends,  and  set 
forth  in  sedan-chairs.  The  sedan-chair  is  the  character- 
istic mode  of  travel  in  China.  Rickshaws  are  metropoli- 
tan luxuries  imported  from  Japan,  and  other  wheeled 
vehicles  confined  only  to  small  areas  in  the  north. 
Through  the  greater  part  of  the  land  the  beasts  of 
burden  are  all  human,  and  the  roads  are  only  single 
trails  through  the  fields.  It  is  marvellous  that  so  vast 
an  empire,  so  closely  knit  as  it  has  been  in  the  past 
under  a  central  government  operating  over  thousands 
of  miles,  should  be  a  land  without  roads,  and  without 
means  of  movement  swifter  than  the  pace  of  a  human 
foot.  Only  the  rivers  have  served  as  highways,  and  upon 
them  the  winds  sometimes  lend  wings  to  travel  and  com- 
merce. In  Fukien  province  the  only  wheeled  vehicle 
that  any  one  had  ever  heard  of  was  a  missionary's  baby- 
carriage.  Yet  all  the  future  of  China  turns  upon  the 
unlocking  of  its  sealed  and  stagnant  life  with  electricity 
and  steam.  The  melancholy  and  sordid  history  of 
these  latter  years  is  written  in  cruelly  obstructed  or 


IT 

basely  founded  attempts  to  furnish  China  with  rail- 
roads. But  this  is  a  story  for  another  to  tell. 

Swinging  in  a  chair  hung  upon  two  long  bamboo  poles, 
I  was  lifted  on  the  shoulders  of  two  coolies.  Had  I  been 
very  stout  or  very  important  I  should  have  been  carried 
by  four  or  six.  The  British  governor  of  Hongkong 
journeys  with  half  a  dozen  bearers,  as  in  a  coach  and 
six,  and  they  are  clothed  in  the  honourable  colour  of  red, 
too.  My  coolies  were  clad  in  nothing  in  particular.  I 
think  they  had  one  ragged  suit  between  them.  We 
started  off  on  a  fast  walk,  Miss  Lulu  in  one  chair  and  I 
in  another.  On  level  ground  the  bearers  would  break 
step,  to  keep  our  chairs  from  swinging  too  much.  But, 
when  they  ascended  a  hill,  they  kept  step,  and  the  chair 
moved  with  a  curious  rhythm  that  almost  suggested  sea- 
sickness. 

Moving  thus,  we  left  behind  the  manure,  the  fleas,  and 
the  curious  inhabitants  of  the  misogynistic  village,  and 
came  out  into  lovely  mountain  country,  quaintly  ter- 
raced from  valley  to  summit  with  little  rice  fields,,  and 
dotted  with  clustering  villages.  From  a  distance  these 
villages  had  a  pleasant  pastoral  prettiness.  Their  curly 
roofs  nestled  among  twisted  old  trees  and  were  beauti- 
fully reflected  in  pools  of  water.  But  near  at  hand  they 
were  vile  beyond  description,  noxious  masses  of  unclean 
animal  life.  For  the  fertility  of  those  little  fields,  now 
so  deeply,  freshly  green  ( each  a  little  garden,  as  it  were, 
cherished  and  caressed  to  the  utmost  yielding)  de- 
pends upon  a  continual  deluge  of  manure.  No  refuse 
or  excrement  whatsoever — of  human  or  animal  origin — 
is  to  be  lost,  and  the  villages  are  the  storage  places  for 
it;  and  the  life  of  the  people  is  spent  on  a  dung-hill. 
No  sooner  had  the  stench  of  one  village  yielded  to  the 


18  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

scent  of  roses  and  the  fresh  mountain  air  than  the  pres- 
ence of  another  was  announced  to  our  nostrils,  often 
with  a  blast  from  a  preliminary  battalion  of  the  in- 
sects that  flourish  in  barn-yards. 

Yet  nothing  could  darken  the  romance  of  that  fresh 
country-side,  all  glamourous  and  glowing  as  it  was,  that 
day,  in  the  sunshine.  It  was  the  time  of  the  transplant- 
ing of  rice,  and  every  man  and  every  little  boy  who  had 
outgrown  his  mother's  apron  strings  was  in  the  fields. 
So  the  villages  were  solely  in  the  possession  of  the  bound- 
foot  women  whose  feet  could  not  carry  them  along  the 
perilous  paths  of  the  rice  fields,  the  little  children,  the 
small-pox  patients,  and  the  men  far  gone  in  leprosy. 
A  frowsy  lot  they  were,  except  the  women,  who  were 
amazingly  neat  in  their  blue  trousers,  red  shoes,  and 
smooth  coiled  coiffures.  As  we  passed  through  village 
after  village,  the  whole  population  would  turn  out  to 
gaze  upon  us,  but  Miss  Lulu  led  me  swiftly  on  the  way 
without  social  intercourse,  for  she  was  bound  for  a 
wilder  country.  Yet,  for  all  our  indifference,  our  fame 
went  before  us.  And  sometimes  those  who  had  heard 
of  missionaries  and  their  healing  magic  brought  out  the 
lame  and  the  halt  and  the  leprous  and  even  the  small- 
pox patients  to  be  touched  by  me  and  made  well.  Once 
a  demoniac  ran  and  threw  himself  down  before  me, 
shrieking : 

"The  devil  in  that  man  is  crying  to  you  not  to  cast 
him  out,"  said  Miss  Lulu,  briefly. 

"Do  you  think  there  is  really  a  devil  in  him?"  I  asked 
rather  breathlessly,  when  we  had  put  a  safe  distance 
between  him  and  us. 

"Yes,"  she  said.  "There  are  devils  in  a  great  many 
Chinese.  They  sometimes  come  into  a  person  through 
something  he  eats,  but  most  often  through  a  curse,  or  a 


A  frowsy  lot  they  were — all  except  the  women 


"Must  be  a  strange  land,"  said  a  vivacious  young  thing,  "where 
women  wear  skirts" 


"Is  she  married?"  I  wondered,  looking  at  a  lovely, 
satiny  yellow  face 


These,  it  seemed,  were  evidences  of  her  husband's  love 


I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER  10 

terrible  look.  And  they  are  very  hard  to  send  away,  but 
sometimes  the  Christians  do  it  through  praying  and 
spells." 

"The  Christian  missionaries?" 

"Any  Christians,  but  most  often  white  men  who  know 
how  to  pray.  The  devils  are  afraid  of  Christians,  which 
is  shown  by  the  fact  that  there  are  no  devils  in  Christian 
lands." 

As  she  spoke,  I  thought  of  the  stories  of  demoniac 
possession  in  the  New  Testament.  Were  they  not  like 
this? 

By  evening  we  were  coming  higher  into  the  moun- 
tains, whose  green  slopes  gave  to  the  closing  day  an 
aspect  of  gloom  and  loneliness.  We  spent  the  night  in 
a  little  Chinese  inn — a  kind  of  barn  with  a  dirt  floor, 
and  terribly  odiferous.  But  wrapped  in  our  own 
blankets  and  covered  with  mosquito  netting,  beneath  an 
opening  in  the  roof  which  served  as  a  peep-hole  into  a 
world  of  stars,  I  slept  as  one  drunk  with  the  mountain 
ozone  which  I  had  breathed  all  day. 

By  this  time  I  felt  that  I  was  approaching  starvation, 
my  only  diet  for  twenty-four  hours  having  been  unsalted 
rice  and  some  funny  little  yellow  fruit,  like  large  rose- 
apples,  which  Miss  Lulu  called  bee-baws.  All  along  the 
way  Miss  Lulu  had  fared  delicately  on  a  variety  of 
greasy  sweetmeats  and  slimy  stews.  My  squeamishness 
she  regarded  with  some  amazement.  However,  when  the 
second  morning  dawned,  she  bestirred  herself  in  my 
favour.  Leaving  the  inn  very  early,  without  breakfast, 
while  all  the  world  was  steaming  in  the  dewy  gloom 
before  sunrise,  we  went  from  village  to  village,  begging 
for  a  chicken  for  breakfast.  At  last  it  was  forth-coming, 
a  deliciously  tender  bird.  It  was  promptly  stewed  for 
'us  in  some  kind  of  oil  by  a  man  who  ran  a  little  out-of- 


20  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

door  cook-shop,  at  which  the  farmers  en  route  to  the 
fields  were  snatching  condiments  for  their  rice.  Safely 
outside  of  the  perfume  of  the  village,  we  spread  it  on  a 
rock  and  ate  it  with  delight,  though  without  salt,  before 
a  large  audience  of  Chinese. 

Toward  noon  we  came  out  in  the  unsophisticated  vil- 
lages where  no  white  woman,  not  even  a  missionary,  was 
known.  The  coolies  set  down  our  chairs  before  a  cook- 
shop,  where  not  unsavoury  messes  were  steaming  out-of- 
doors.  A  crowd  of  women  emerged  and  cried  in  aston- 
ishment at  the  sight  of  us. 

"See  the  men— the  great,  monstrous  men  that  have 

come." 

"We  are  not  men,"  answered  Miss  Lulu.  "We  are 
women,  and  we  belong  to  a  strange  country." 

"Must  be  strange,"  said  a  vivacious  young  thing, 
"where  women  wear  skirts." 

"Frightfully  immodest,  I  call  it,"  remarked  her 
mother-in-law,  surveying  with  complacency  her  own 
neat  trousers. 

Then  and  there  I  discovered  something  which  stood 
me  in  good  stead  in  my  wanderings  among  women  in 
many  lands — among  the  pygmies  of  the  mountains  and 
high-born  ladies  of  the  zenana,  no  less  than  in  these 
mountain  villages — :  feminine  social  conversation  is  the 
same  the  world  over,  the  shop-talk  of  a  trade  that  is 
universal.  In  the  jungle,  the  harem,  or  the  empresses' 
courts,  you  talk  about  the  same  things  that  serve  when 
you  meet  your  husband's  partner's  wife  at  the  country 
club.  The  formula  is  simple.  Begin  with  clothes,  and 
progress  through  housekeeping  and  husbands  (pro- 
spective or  actual)  to  babies.  All  women  do  it.  Be- 
tween these  Chinese  women  and  me  it  was  instinctive. 
"That  is  a  coiffure,"  I  thought,  eyeing  some  massive 


I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER  21 

coils  of  shining  black  hair  transfixed  with  something  like 
two  pounds  of  silver  pins. 

The  owner  of  this  hirsute  masterpiece  looked  at 
me  and  began  to  laugh.  Turning  to  the  others,  she 
said: 

"What  has  she  done  to  her  hair?" 

"It  isn't  hair  at  all,"  said  another.  "It's  something 
else  on  her  head." 

"It's  a  pretty  colour,"  remarked  an  old  woman,  "but 
it's  odd  to  see  it  where  hair  ought  to  be." 

When  Miss  Lulu  interpreted  these  remarks  to  me,  I 
told  her  to  assure  them  that  my  hair  was  really  hair  and 
grew  fast. 

This  statement  amused  them.  It  was  plain  to  them 
that  hair  should  be  smooth  and  black.  Mine  was  crinkly 
and  yellow.  Obviously  then  it  was  not  hair.  But  one, 
less  sceptical,  produced  a  comb  and  a  small  piece  of  pol- 
ished brass  for  a  mirror. 

"It's  hair,  all  right,"  she  said,  "but  it  has  never  been 
combed.  Perhaps  if  you  will  comb  it  and  put  some  oil 
on  it,  it  won't  seem  so  odd." 

The  rest  stood  around  me,  as  we  might  stand  around 
a  savage,  all  ready  to  instruct  me  in  the  customs  of  civi- 
lized life.  I  believe  that  they  began  to  hope  that  I  might 
adopt  pantaloons  and  look  like  a  real  lady. 

I  dodged  their  missionary  efforts  as  best  I  might,  and 
from  hair  we  proceeded  to  husbands. 

"Is  she  married?"  I  wondered,  looking  at  a  lovely 
satiny  yellow  face. 

"She  is  asking,"  said  Miss  Lulu,  "whether  you  have  a 
husband." 

I  replied  that  I  had  none. 

No  husband !    They  looked  on  me  pityingly. 

"Couldn't  your  parents  get  any  one  to  marry  you?" 


22  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

asked  an  old  mother,  with  a  benevolent  face  and  the 
tiniest  red  shoes  in  the  world. 

"In  our  country  we  choose  our  own  husbands,"  I  re- 
plied. 

This  statement  was  received  with  incredulity.  I  be- 
lieve they  thought  it  was  just  a  clever  trick  on  my  part 
to  make  it  seem  as  if  my  state  was  my  own  choosing. 

In  the  next  village  we  encountered  more  simple  and 
admiring  creatures.  A  little  fellow  with  a  frowsy  pig- 
tail ran  out  to  meet  us,  scampering  along  on  the  narrow, 
curving  trail  between  the  pools  of  the  rice-fields,  with  the 
assurance  of  a  tight-rope  walker. 

"This,"  said  he  to  Miss  Lulu,  looking  at  me  apprais- 
ingly,  "is  a  White  Wonder.  Its  skin  is  whiter  than  the 
bean  cake.  If  I  could  take  it  and  exhibit  it  in  the  vil- 
lage, I  should  be  glad." 

His  proposal  delighted  me.  It  was  my  first  chance 
to  penetrate  into  the  homes  of  these  people.  When  we 
reached  the  village,  his  procedure  showed  something  of 
that  efficiency  which  the  modern  schools  of  salesmanship 
consider  a  unique  discovery  of  their  own.  Calling  two 
pock-mocked  urchins  as  lieutenants,  he  despatched  them 
ahead  of  us,  from  house  to  house,  to  announce  our  com- 
ing. The  first  house  was  like  a  little  stable.  The  floor 
was  of  dirt,  and  on  one  side  was  a  loft  for  dried  grass. 
Under  this  stood  a  water-buffalo  in  a  cloud  of  insects. 
Only  a  low  partition  fenced  off  the  animal  from  the  hu- 
man tenants.  In  the  centre  of  the  roof  was  a  large 
space  intended  as  an  entrance  for  light  and  air  and  an 
exit  for  smoke. 

When  I  entered  the  house,  a  most  mannerly  old  lady, 
with  a  kind,  toothless  smile,  bustled  out  to  receive  me, 
and  set  a  stool  for  me  under  this  sky-light.  Would  I  be 
so  kind,  she  asked,  as  to  take  off  my  hat?  I  did  so,  and 


I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER  23 

as  I  revealed  my  coil  of  hair,  there  was  a  prolonged  ex- 
clamation which  brought  several  daughters-in-law  on 
the  scene. 

"Look  at  this  old  woman,"  they  cried. 

"She  is  not  an  old  woman,"  said  the  mother-in-law. 
"She  is  a  very  young  child.  Look  at  her  skin.  Is  it  not 
tender  and  white,  like  the  skin  of  a  young  child  that  has 
never  worked  in  the  rice-fields?  Look  at  her  hands.  Are 
they  the  hands  of  one  who  is  old  enough  to  do  work?" 

The  hands  attracted  them  at  once,  and  they  fluttered 
around  me  wistfully,  putting  their  own  horny  brown 
paws  next  to  mine,  stroking  the  skin  of  my  fingers, 
tenderly,  fearfully,  as  if  these  delicate  appendages  of 
the  white  lady  might  break.  "Ah,"  said  they,  "it  is 
plain  that  your  father  is  a  man  of  many  servants.  You 
have  not  worked." 

But  the  more  they  observed  me,  the  more  perplexing 
became  the  question  of  my  age. 

"Surely  she  is  very  old,"  said  one  young  girl.  "Her 
hair  is  perfectly  white." 

"Oh,"  replied  another.  "They  are  born  with  white 
hair  in  her  country.  When  they  are  old,  it  is  dark  like 
hers,"  pointing  to  Miss  Lulu. 

At  the  moment  I  smiled  at  their  provincial  notions. 
But  since  I  have  travelled  in  so  many  lands,  I  often 
think  what  a  marvellous  "sport"  the  blonde  Nordic  type 
is  among  human  faces.  Everywhere  else  among  men 
there  is  the  same  general  colour  scheme,  with  only  a 
variation  in  shade  from  pale  cream  colour  to  black. 
The  standard  human  countenance,  I  am  convinced,  is  to 
be  painted  in  shades  of  sepia,  and  all  this  gold  and 
titian  hair,  these  blue  eyes  and  rose-tinted  cheeks, 
represent  Nature  on  a  little  spree,  "off  her  trolley,"  as  it 
were. 


24  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

By  the  time  I  had  reached  the  point  where  these  dim 
gleams  of  philosophy  began  to  penetrate  my  enjoyment 
of  the  good  ladies'  wonder,  my  small  manager  was  mak- 
ing desperate  signs  to  us  to  move  on.  He  wished  to  ex- 
hibit his  prize  in  a  good  many  other  places,  and  the 
schedule  required  speed. 

The  next  house  was  a  mansion.  It  was  perhaps  as 
large  as  the  "two  rooms  and  bath"  in  which  fastidious 
New  Yorkers  now  reside,  neatly  paved  with  brick 
and  furnished  with  some  black  carved  furniture.  The 
ladies  were  well-dressed  and  well-cared  for.  Perhaps 
their  higher  social  station  had  given  them  a  greater  ap- 
preciation of  exotic  types,  or  possibly  it  had  taught 
them  deceiving  manners.  For  they  were  frankly  admir- 
ing. With  them  I  entered  into  a  considerable  discus- 
sion of  the  ways  of  women  in  our  land.  They  listened 
with  amused  smiles,  looking  at  each  other  now  and  then 
with  little  exclamations,  but  offering  no  crude  criticisms 
after  the  manner  of  the  vulgar.  Complacency  was  writ 
large  upon  them.  They  were  glad  they  were  not  poor 
like  the  rest  of  the  village,  and  glad  that  they  did  not 
look  like  me;  glad  that  their  feet  measured  to  the  minia- 
ture standards  of  good  form,  and  that  their  parents 
saved  them  the  risk  of  picking  husbands  on  their  own ; 
glad  they  lived  in  that  village  and  nowhere  else— and 
had  they  known  the  language  of  Gopher  Prairie,  they 
would  no  doubt  have  told  me  that  theirs  was  the  "best 
little  old  town  going."  The  beginning  and  end  of  their 
opinion  about  the  position  and  freedom  of  women  in  our 
country  was  that  it  was  "very  odd." 

Leaving  these  elegant  females,  I  was  next  precipitated 
into  a  nursery.  At  the  door  of  one  house,  in  front  of 
which  some  convalescents  from  smallpox  were  sunning 
themselves,  stood  a  meek,  worn  little  body. 


I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER  25 

"Poor  soul,"  thought  I.  "She  does  not  look  like  the 
petted  wife  of  an  adoring  husband.  I  wonder  if  he  is 
good  to  her." 

Just  then  she  began  to  vociferate  earnestly.  "She  is 
asking,"  said  Miss  Lulu,  "whether  your  husband  really 
loves  you." 

Apparently  not  understanding  my  answer,  she 
toddled  into  the  house  and  returned  with  six  dirty,  pock- 
marked, frowsy  urchins.  These,  it  seemed,  were  evidence 
of  her  husband's  love.  What  had  I  to  show  for  it?  I 
said  that  I  had  no  children.  Instantly  the  news  spread 
throughout  the  neighbourhood.  As  I  went  on,  from 
house  to  house,  the  women  gathered  around  me  with 
little  inarticulate  murmurs  of  pity.  No  children !  How 
very  sad.  Each  would  collect  her  own  ragged,  sickly 
brood,  and  look  upon  me  with  sorrowful  pride,  from  the 
heights  of  triumphant  motherhood.  One  woman  who 
was  a  leper,  held  up  her  baby,  half  tauntingly,  as  I 
passed  her  abode. 

"At  least,"  said  her  rheumy  eyes,  "I  have  this." 

So  I  passed  from  house  to  house,  and  from  village  to 
village,  like  a  circus  on  parade.  I  was  mistaken  for 
everything  from  a  baby  to  an  ancestor.  But  as  I  went 
on,  a  certain  wonder  seized  me  that  human  nature  should 
be  everywhere  so  much  alike,  not  only  in  its  essential 
emotions,  but  in  its  mannerisms.  After  all,  these  vil- 
lages might  have  been  any  small  towns  in  America.  And 
this  was  the  more  noticeable  because  economically  they 
differed  considerably  from  our  small  towns.  Our  small 
towns  are  trading  centres  for  the  farms.  The  life  of  the 
agricultural  population  is  isolated  on  separate  plots  of 
land,  each  home  standing  alone.  An  Oriental  village, 
on  the  other  hand,  in  China  or  India  or  Japan,  is  some- 
thing like  a  communal  farm-home.  The  people,  instead 


26  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  placing  each  his  home  on  his  own  land,  group  their 
dwellings  for  protection  and  mutual  service,  with  their 
lands  in  a  circle  around  them.  In  the  morning  they  go 
out  to  work  in  their  fields,  and  in  the  evening  they  re- 
turn to  the  village,  bringing  their  animals  with  them, 
and  locking  them  up  in  their  own  houses  for  protection 
against  thieves.  Some  few,  of  course,  may  be  specialized 
for  shop-keeping  or  cooking,  but  often  this  work  is  left 
to  the  women  or  is  done  by  men  who  are  also  farmers. 
The  village  is,  therefore,  the  communal  home  of  the  agri- 
cultural population,  and  is  largely  self-sufficient. 

But,  though  the  author  of  Main  Street  ascribes  the 
stagnant  life  of  our  small  towns  to  their  parasitic  char- 
acter, as  middle-men,  and  often  superfluous  middle-men, 
in  the  midst  of  a  productive  agricultural  life,  I  could  not 
see  that  the  greater  economic  productivity  of  these 
villagers  added  much  to  the  spiritual  content  of  their 
lives.  Kindly,  prudish,  mid- Victorian  in  their  moral 
ideals,  inured  to  dirt,  smallpox,  bound  feet,  and  fleas, 
they  knew  of  nothing  and  cared  for  nothing  outside  of 
their  own  little  group  of  hovels.  Of  the  political  experi- 
ments of  China  they  were  ignorant ;  to  wars  and  revolu- 
tions, blandly  indifferent.  But  they  could  wax  rather 
excited  about  the  bandits  in  the  mountains  who  robbed 
the  next  village  but  one,  or  the  oppressions  of  their  own 
village  head-man. 

Yet  sometimes  as  I  journeyed  among  them,  upon 
them  would  dawn  the  truth  that  all  women  are  sisters 
under  the  skin,  and  that  this  enormous,  mis-shapen, 
mis-coloured  creature  out  of  strange  far-away  lands  was 
a  creature  like  themselves.  And  between  us  sprang  up 
companionship  and  understanding,  founded  in  those 
great  elemental  cares  and  interests  of  womanhood, 
which  no  amount  of  special  training,  and  no  divergence 


I  BECOME  A  WHITE  WONDER  27 

of  colour  in  hair  and  skin  and  eyes  can  ever  change  or 
eradicate.  But  sometimes,  too,  the  modern  maid  within 
me,  the  denizen  of  cities,  and  the  wider  paths  of  the 
world,  would  assert  herself,  and  I  would  think  in  ex- 
asperation : 

"If  only  something  could  give  them  a  jolt!" 
In  this  I  spoke  as  a  prophet  though  I  knew  it  not,  for 
the  jolt  was  even  then  coming  their  way  and  making 
havoc  among  the  ancestors.    But  this  is  a  tale  for  an- 
other chapter. 


CHAPTEE  III 

HAVOC  AMONG  THE  ANCESTORS 

WE  were  now  headed  for  Hingwha,  Miss  Lulu  escorting 
me  till  she  could  deliver  me  inta  the  charge  of  a  mis- 
sionary. Slipping  rapidly  through  the  villages,  we  now 
avoided  their  sociable  inhabitants  in  an  anxiety  to  get 
on.  Instead  of  the  manners  of  the  living,  I  turned  my 
attention  to  the  tiny  wayside  shrines,  full  of  tawdry, 
tarnished  images  of  gods  and  goddesses  and  devils,  and 
to  the  tombs  of  the  ancestors,  and  the  red  arches  to 
pious  widows,  which  gave  a  romance,  half  human,  half 
unearthly,  to  the  narrow  mountain  trails.  For  the  lives 
of  these  little  grey  villages  were  environed  with  a  world 
of  gods  and  demons,  and  the  ghosts  of  the  dead  who  had 
died  through  hundreds  of  years — gaudy  gods,  purple, 
and  red,  and  gold,  and  green ;  and  demons  of  wind  and 
water;  and  ghosts  of  men  whose  social  power  is  singu- 
larly enlarged  by  the  grave.  Coming  out  of  the  lively 
swarm  and  hum  of  the  village,  into  the  wide  presence  of 
the  sky  and  the  hills  and  the  endless  procession  of 
shrines  and  tombs,  I  often  felt  as  if  I  were  emerging  into 
a  world  of  spirits,  and  the  very  sunshine  seemed  to  have 
about  it  a  kind  of  ghostliness. 

But  the  ancestors  were  not  having  it  all  their  way  in 
those  regions,  nor  the  widows  who  were  called  pious 
because,  being  young  and  fair,  they  would  not  take  a 
second  husband,  but  remained  true  to  the  dead.  So 
greatly  does  death  and  the  entrance  into  the  heritage 
of  the  ancestors  exalt  a  man  that  he  who  in  life  was  a 

28 


HAVOC  AMONG  THE  ANCESTORS  29 

commonplace  soul,  with  a  bad  temper  or  a  set  of  dull 
wits,  becomes  a  hero  in  his  tomb,  and  faithfulness  to 
him  is  like  faithfulness  to  one's  own  king  or  country— 
a  virtue  to  be  rewarded  with  a  memorial  arch,  and  pub- 
lic respect  forever.  Yet  another  spirit,  I  found,  was 
abroad  in  the  mountains,  and  making  inroads  even  into 
the  psychology  of  widows. 

As  we  went  through  the  villages,  I  became  conscious 
of  a  change  of  attitude*  There  was  a  much  livelier  curi- 
osity, a  certain  tension  and  argument,  and  sometimes 
positive  hostility. 

"Again  and  again,"  said  Miss  Lulu,  with  a  puzzled 
air,  "they  ask  me :  Are  we  come  to  insult  the  ancestors? 
And  others  say,  are  we  those  marvellous  people  who  have 
knowledge  of  everything?  And  some  say,  too,  are  we 
come  to  make  their  girls  wantons?  I  do  not  understand. 
It  is  a  strange  talk  that  they  have." 

Then  suddenly  as  we  journeyed  across  a  field  to  a 
group  of  huts  in  the  distance,  a  strange  sweet  sound 
floated  on  the  morning  air.  "Onward,  Christian  sol- 
diers," on  my  life!  Neither  in  time  nor  tune,  but  quite 
unmistakable!  As  we  drew  near,  we  found  the  place 
in  an  uproar.  All  around  the  Confucian  temple,  the 
temple  of  the  ancestors,  was  stretched  canvas,  as  at  an 
out-of-door  camp-meeting  or  a  Chautauqua,  and  from 
within  issued  the  liveliest  sounds  that  ever  I  heard  in 
the  courts  of  the  gods.  There  was  an  uproar  of  voices 
in  speech,  the  beating  of  a  drum,  and  a  struggle  and 
wail  of  Christian  hymns.  And  thither,  by  all  the  paths 
of  the  rice  fields,  the  people  were  running,  with  wonder 
upon  their  faces. 

Miss  Lulu  promptly  invited  the  coolies  to  set  down 
our  chairs,  and,  going  before  me,  elbowed  her  way  in, 
with  her  usual  air  of  authority  and  a  lively  sprinkling 


30  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  Chinese  invectives.  We  entered  one  of  the  bare, 
red  Confucian  temple  halls,  now  enlarged  by  ante-rooms 
of  canvas,  and  adorned  with  paraphernalia  quite  unmis- 
takable. It  was  crowded  with  people,  especially  with 
women,  and  their  eyes  were  turned  in  wondering  atten- 
tion to  a  young  man  on  an  improvised  platform  who  was 
haranguing  them  passionately.  Behind  him  sat  a  choir 
of  Chinese  school-girls,  lovely  little  creatures,  fresh  and 
clean  as  flowers,  in  pink  and  blue  trouser  suits.  They 
wore  hair-ribbons  that  never  grew  in  the  Celestial  em- 
pire, and,  beneath  their  left  arms,  large  masculine  hand- 
kerchiefs, which  were  also  not  indigenous,  were  pinned 
with  safety  pins,  for  ready  reference.  After  every  few 
sentences  of  speech,  the  young  man  would  pause,  with 
a  resounding  thump  upon  an  open  Bible,  and  a  little  girl 
would  come  forth,  shyly  bow,  speak  a  few  words  by 
rote,  and  return  to  her  place.  At  other  times  the  whole 
group  would  sing,  to  the  accompaniment  of  a  drum  and 
a  fiddle.  Behind  them  the  walls  were  covered  with 
Bible  pictures,  and  from  the  rafters  dangled  long  strips 
of  red  tissue  paper  covered  with  black  characters,  which 
I  later  learned  were  Bible  texts. 

It  was  the  gayest  Christian  meeting  I  had  ever  seen, 
and,  to  the  congregation,  much  like  a  circus,  I  fancy. 
After  the  pretty  maidens  had  performed  a  while,  each 
displaying  her  unbound  foot,  encased  in  a  bewitching 
boudoir  slipper  of  pink  or  blue,  with  rosettes,  the  ear- 
nest young  man  took  the  stage  all  to  himself.  His  speech 
was  fiery  and  radical.  Did  they  see  these  girls,  he 
asked?  Did  they  observe  how  clever  they  were,  clever 
as  Confucian  scholars,  how  well  and  rosy,  how  nice  their 
feet  looked?  Well,  that  was  because  they  were  Christian 
girls,  and  were  properly  educated.  Here  followed  all 
the  arguments  on  the  education  of  women  which  were 


The  ancestors  were  not  having  it  all  their  own  way 


Thither,  by  all  the  paths  of  the  rice  fields,  the  people 
were  running 


The  tiny  tots  basked,  like  kittens,  in  the  sunshine 
of  the  mission 


So  the  Bishop  went  his  way,  distributing  his   simple  gift  of 
peace  even  in  the  red  courts  of  Confucian  temples 


HAVOC  AMONG  THE  ANCESTORS    31 

used  on  our  own  great-grandfathers,  with  scathing  ref- 
erences to  current  methods  of  railroading  girls  into  mat- 
rimony, quite  unprepared  and  without  choice  on  their 
part,  followed  by  a  speech  on  real  versus  false  modesty, 
and  a  complete  physiological  analysis  of  bound  feet. 
The  congregation  listened  with  amazement  and  horror, 
riveted  to  the  spot.  It  was  like  telling  villagers  in  some 
parts  of  our  country  that  bobbed  hair  and  cigarettes  do 
not  make  an  immoral  woman,  and  that  a  wife's  economic 
independence  does  not  wreck  the  home — only  much 
worse.  From  this  he  passed  to  a  spicy  description  of 
their  own  village  life — their  ignorance,  their  conceit, 
their  scandals  and  back-biting  and  cruelty  in  applying 
their  own  mores — as,  for  instance,  when  they  permit  a 
childless  wife  to  be  divorced  without  any  means  of  sub- 
sistence. He  told  them  of  the  dirt  and  disease  in  which 
they  lived,  and  declared  that  fleas,  smallpox,  and  a 
dung-hill  life  were  not  necessary,  and  there  was  a  great 
country  named  America  where  they  did  not  exist — at 
least  in  such  profusion.  The  people  listened  incredu- 
lously. As  well  tell  an  old-fashioned  house-wife  that 
babies  need  not  have  colic,  or  a  business  man  that  slums 
need  not  exist  and  private  fortunes  are  immoral.  He 
concluded  with  a  tender  account  of  Christ  as  the  Master 
of  Utopias,  and  a  picture  of  a  Christian  society  such 
as  exists  nowhere  on  earth,  though  he  was,  no  doubt, 
right  in  this :  that  some  places  are  nearer  to  it  than  a 
Chinese  village. 

When  he  ended  there  was  a  hub-bub.  The  flood 
of  radical  opinion  had  overwhelmed  the  intelligence  of 
some  and  left  them  stupefied.  Some  left  in  displeasure. 
But  the  children  and  frivolous  young  women  stayed  to 
hear  more  of  the  strange  music,  and  there  was  a  little 
knot  of  people  genuinely  interested,  though  puzzled. 


32  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Miss  Lulu  was  ready  to  go.  She  was  a  Christian  of 
sorts,  enough  at  least  to  look  down  upon  the  Chinese  as 
heathen,  but  she  had  a  superstitious  dislike  of  mission- 
aries. 

"That  young  man  thinks  he  knows  more  than  Con- 
fucius," she  remarked.  "When  he  is  older,  he  will  be 
wiser." 

But  I  was  thoughtful.  The  speech  gave  me  a  new 
light  on  Christian  propaganda  in  the  Orient.  What 
red-hot  stuff  this  gospel  was,  at  least  in  the  hands  of 
these  fiery  youths,  fresh  from  Christian  colleges,  no 
doubt,  and  unchecked  by  missionaries.  Careering  thus 
through  the  villages,  throwing  a  challenge  to  ancestors 
and  gods,  and  the  ancient  codes  of  the  land,  what  seeds 
of  social  revolution  they  were  scattering!  Toward  eve- 
ning, in  a  grey  twilight  shot  with  soft  rain,  we  heard 
another  strain  of  music.  It  was  a  second  division  of  this 
army  of  evangels,  marching  around  a  village  with  drum 
and  horns,  announcing  a  meeting  for  the  next  day. 
Boldly  they  marched,  young  men,  and  young  women  who 
paddled  shamelessly  along  on  unbound  feet,  with  the 
dreams  of  their  school-days  yet  about  them,  and  youth's 
unvanquished  courage  in  their  eyes.  The  veriest  aristo- 
crats among  the  poor  villagers,  by  reason  of  their  finer 
features,  their  cleanliness,  and  fresh  clothes,  marching 
and  singing,  they  seemed  an  apparition  in  that  humble 
place.  As  we  passed  on  toward  another  little  village 
whose  red  fires  gleamed  through  the  deepening  grey 
of  night,  their  voices  singing  out  of  the  mists  behind 
me  seemed  spiritual  and  strange. 

That  night  I  lodged  with  a  missionary,  and  some  of 
this  new-found  romance  in  Christianity  vanished  in  the 
shop-talk  of  his  calling  with  which  he  entertained  me. 
One  more  day's  travelling  with  the  missionary  brought 


HAVOC  AMONG  THE  ANCESTORS     33 

us  within  sight  of  Hingwha,  the  city  where  I  was  to 
meet  the  Bishop  again.  All  afternoon  our  course  lay  by 
winding  creeks  and  inlets,  and  the  keen  breath  of  the 
sea  mingled  pleasantly  with  the  fragrance  of  wayside 
roses.  At  sunset  we  reached  the  city  wall. 

The  city  looked  beautiful  in  the  sunset,  the  curled 
roofs  of  the  houses  almost  hidden  in  the  luxuriant  foli- 
age of  orchards.  Only  the  odours  and  the  evil  twinkle  of 
millions  of  insects  dancing  in  every  bar  of  evening  light 
marred  the  impression  of  happiness.  In  the  distance 
I  saw  the  large,  angular  buildings  of  the  mission  tower- 
ing above  the  trees,  and  in  a  few  minutes  we  were  within 
the  walls  of  the  compound. 

Then  I  knew  why,  to  the  early  Christians  and  the  men 
of  the  Orient,  Paradise  was  a  walled  garden.  Within 
that  blessed  circle  of  brick  and  mortar,  there  was  an- 
other world,  a  world  of  lawns  and  clean,  verandaed 
houses,  a  bit  of  America  transplanted.  A  blue-eyed  boy 
in  white  linen  was  standing  at  the  gate  to  welcome  us. 
Shouting  "Mamma,  Mamma,  they've  come,"  he  went 
skipping  up  the  walk  between  green  lawns  and  rows  of 
flaming  nasturtiums.  There  was  a  vision  of  wide,  cool 
rooms,  with  Chinese  rugs  on  the  floor  and  roses  in  great 
Chinese  vases — roses  fresh  and  dewy  everywhere — 
while  the  gentle  servants  came  pattering  around  with 
cold  water  and  white  towels,  and  the  cares  and  the  dust 
of  the  day  vanished  in  one  heavenly  sensation  of  clean- 
liness, kindness,  and  peace. 

"Verily,"  I  thought,  "the  young  man  was  right.  And 
there  are  some  who,  just  by  reason  of  not  living  in  a 
Chinese  village,  know  Paradise." 


CHAPTER  IV 

A  PIOUS  INTERLUDE 

"MY  dear,  more  fun!  We're  going  itinerating  to 
scandalize  the  heathen.  And  you're  going,  too,  because 
Dad  says  you  will  be  a  moral  influence  on  me." 

It  was  the  fresh  voice  of  the  Incorrigible  Daughter, 
two  hours  later  on  the  Saturday  evening  of  my  arrival 
at  Hingwha,  scattering  the  echoes  of  psalm-singing  in 
the  mission  compound  with  privileged  impudence.  I 
looked  at  her  like  one  famished  for  the  sight  of  a  fair 
white  face.  All  the  evening  our  tongues  raced  each 
other.  We  made  scandalous  signs  to  each  other  during 
evening  prayers,  and  passed  notes  in  the  hymn  book. 
They  had  come  to  Hingwha  more  directly,  after  a  day  or 
two  in  Foochow,  and,  well — there  was  a  youth  at  the  Y. 
M.  C.  A.  just  out  from  home,  and  not  so  pious  as  some — 
and — that  was  about  all  there  was  to  it,  except  that  her 
observations  of  villages  were  naturally  quite  secondary. 
On  Monday  we  were  to  start  back  by  a  different  route 
from  that  by  which  they  had  come,  and  I  was  to  come 
with  them.  But  meanwhile  there  was  Sunday  to  worry 
through,  and,  "my  dear,"  said  Dorothy,  "there  will  be 
some  praying  in  this  place!" 

On  the  whole  I  found  Sunday  not  half  so  bad  as 
Dorothy  prophesied.  Almost  at  dawn  the  Chinese  be- 
gan pouring  into  the  compound  for  services.  As  I 
watched  them  come,  beaming,  eager,  washed,  adorned, 
I  suddenly  realized  what  the  foreign  religion  meant  to 
these  simple  villagers,  so  far  removed  from  the  currents 

34 


A  PIOUS  INTERLUDE  35 

of  the  world's  life.  Something  to  do,  something  to  strive 
for,  something  to  hope  for,  something  to  make  to-morrow 
different  from  to-day,  and  one  day  in  the  toiling  seven 
not  as  other  days — this  was  what  the  mission  had 
brought  to  them.  They  had  gone  round  and  round  like 
water-buffaloes  treading  the  water  wheels,  round  and 
round,  blind-folded,  in  one  changeless  circle,  knowing 
nothing,  hearing  nothing  outside  the  rice-fields  and  the 
ill-smelling  walls  of  their  own  houses.  Learning  to  read 
the  simple  Romanized,  and  memorizing  the  hymns  alone, 
opened  to  them  vast  new  worlds  of  thought  and  fancy. 
Most,  of  course,  had  refused  the  new  draught  of  learn- 
ing, turning  back  with  complacency  or  indifference  to 
their  own  customs  and  their  own  gods.  But  those  who 
took  it  thus,  who  rejoiced  to  stop  work  of  a  Sunday, 
surely,  in  them,  there  had  been  need  of  a  little  more  life. 

To  the  women,  especially,  it  was  all  a  glorious  ad- 
venture. The  walk  to  the  mission  was,  for  many  of 
them,  the  longest  walk  they  had  ever  taken  in  their  lives, 
their  first  excursion  into  the  great  world,  their  first  at- 
tempt really  to  rise  and  do  something  besides  the  mo- 
notonous traditional  tasks  of  the  household.  And  as 
they  came  toddling  in  on  their  bound  feet  the  wonder,  the 
daring,  the  surprised  sense  of  power  which  shone  in  their 
faces  was  pathetic  to  see.  Whatever  the  new  gospel 
meant  to  them,  I  think  this  opening  of  the  doors  of  their 
lives  to  the  breath  of  a  larger  world  must  surely  have 
been  wholesome. 

So  all  day  long  there  were  singing  and  Bible  classes 
and  services  for  everybody,  from  the  tiny  tots  who 
basked  in  the  general  kindliness  of  the  mission  like 
kittens  in  the  sun  and  went  away  clutching  picture 
cards,  to  worn  men  and  women  in  whose  eyes  a  new  curi- 
osity about  life  gleamed  dully.  Next  day,  before  we 


36  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

started,  there  was  an  even  greater  buzz,  for  many  had 
come  back  to  school.  There  were  kindergartens  and 
schools  for  children  of  all  ages,  and  grave  boys  in  gowns 
and  winsome  lassies  in  trousers  were  conning  their 
lessons.  But  most  touching  of  all  was  a  class  where 
mothers  might  learn  to  read  the  Bible.  A  woman  with 
her  baby  at  her  breast  was  teaching  the  class ;  and  other 
women  with  children  on  their  knees  were  trying  to  make 
out  the  meaning  of  great  characters  on  large  pages, 
while  other  infants  were  creeping  on  the  floor,  cooing 
and  rolling  over  each  other  like  puppies. 

Nor  were  the  wonders  of  the  mission  confined  to 
Sunday  services.  During  tiffin,  we  suddenly  heard  a 
delighted  cackle  in  the  adjoining  room.  Running  out, 
we  found  an  old,  old  Chinese  woman  who  had  strayed 
in  from  somewhere,  and  was  enjoying  herself  hugely — 
staring,  giggling,  chattering  with  amazement.  I  never 
saw  a  woman  so  old.  She  had  one  long  black  tooth,  and 
her  eyes  were  bleared  and  almost  closed  with  age.  Yet 
she  had  some  of  the  charm  so  frequent  among  old  people 
in  China.  The  freedom  and  consequence  they  enjoy,  as 
respected  heads  of  a  whole  army  of  children,  grandchil- 
dren, and  great-grandchildren  and  the  release  from  eco- 
nomic pressure,  gives  to  the  old  men,  and  especially  to 
the  old  women,  a  certain  liveliness  and  spirit,  often  in 
notable  contrast  to  the  sullen  mien  of  the  young.  So 
this  old  woman  came  tottering  in  on  her  tiny  red  shoes, 
taking  possession  of  the  house  with  the  self-assurance 
of  a  privileged  character,  marvelling  at  the  great  house, 
each  room  larger  than  any  hut  in  a  village— at  the  rugs, 
at  the  furniture,  and  at  us. 

Suddenly  her  eye  fell  upon  a  long  mirror  at  the  end 
of  the  room,  and  in  it  the  toddling,  trousered  figure  of 
an  old  woman.  She  screamed  in  delight.  Here  was 


A  PIOUS  INTERLUDE  37 

another  old  woman,  just  as  astonished  as  she  was.  She 
advanced  to  the  other  old  woman,  asking  her  what  she 
thought  of  this  place.  The  other  old  woman  did  not 
answer.  Our  guest  was  puzzled  by  the  silence.  But  she 
smiled  pleasantly  at  the  other  old  woman,  and  was  evi- 
dently reassured  to  receive  a  smile  in  return.  Soon  she 
began  to  notice  something  queer  about  the  other  old 
woman.  The  creature  was  imitating  everything  she  did ! 
Advancing  to  the  mirror  in  another  attempt  to  establish 
social  relations,  she  was  delighted  to  see  her  elusive 
country  woman  advancing  on  her  part.  Finally  she 
put  out  her  hand  tentatively,  by  way  of  greeting,  and 
encountered  the  hard  cold  surface  of  the  mirror.  She 
jumped  with  astonishment  and  tried  again — with  the 
same  results. 

What  she  thought  I  don't  know,  but  suddenly  she 
threw  back  her  head  and  cackled — cackled  and  cackled 
with  glee  till  her  staff  vibrated  on  the  floor  with  her 
mirth.  When  she  saw  the  other  old  woman  laughing, 
too,  the  peals  were  redoubled.  I  thought  she  would 
laugh  herself  into  apoplexy.  But  a  servant,  entering 
just  then,  took  her  in  charge,  and  she  and  the  other  old 
woman  were  led  simultaneously  away. 

Yet  not  all  the  pathos  of  that  Sunday  at  the  mission 
was  in  the  lives  of  the  Chinese  guests  and  communicants. 
That  afternoon  a  missionary  came  into  the  compound 
with  his  wife  from  a  distance,  bearing  in  his  arms  his 
wee  golden-haired  baby  for  whom  he  wished  baptism 
at  the  hands  of  the  Bishop.  It  was  a  sunny,  tropical 
afternoon  and  the  Anglican  missionaries — the  only 
other  white  people  in  the  compound — had  gathered  on 
one  of  the  vine-covered,  flowery  verandas  to  pay  their 
respects  to  our  Bishop.  So  they  held  the  simple  service 
there,  out  of  doors,  and  all  the  pomp  and  ceremony  of  a 


38  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

great  cathedral  were  never  more  touchingly  solemn. 
After  our  prolonged  contemplation  of  darker  children, 
the  little  blonde  head  ruffled  by  the  summer  breeze 
seemed  fair  and  angelic.  The  noble  words  of  the  service 
acquired  a  peculiar  meaning  and  tenderness,  as  the 
young  parents,  so  far  away  from  home  and  the  sustain- 
ing props  of  their  own  civilization,  promised  to  bring 
up  their  little  one  in  the  faith  of  their  fathers. 

After  he  had  finished  the  formal  prayer  of  the  service, 
the  Bishop,  holding  the  child  close  in  his  arms,  added  a 
few  words  of  his  own  for  the  future  of  the  little  one  for 
whom  the  rite  of  baptism  and  the  vow  of  the  parents 
were  his  only  pledge  that  he  would  receive  his  normal 
inheritance;  and  for  whom  the  customs  of  his  own  home 
must  be  the  sole  representative  of  all  that  his  fore- 
fathers across  the  sea  had  shaped  for  their  children 
through  the  long  and  struggling  centuries. 

And  seeing  all  this,  though  the  day  passed  cheerfully 
enough,  I  went  to  bed  that  night  feeling  a  little  strained 
and  overwrought,  as  one  who  has  passed  through  an 
emotional  crisis,  and  lay  awake  for  a  long  time  looking 
at  the  great  southern  stars  in  that  alien,  mysterious  sky. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  HERITAGE  OF  NOAH 

BY  evening  of  the  next  day  I  felt  like  one  of  those 
wicked  ones  whom  Noah  did  not  take  into  the  ark.  Yet 
there  was  no  promise  of  the  deluge  in  the  wild  rose  sky 
that  bloomed  over  the  misty  green  of  the  rice-fields,  at 
dawn,  on  Monday  morning.  And,  when  after  averting 
a  few  tragedies  among  the  coolies  and  distributing  some 
last  minute  episcopal  blessings,  we  at  last  set  out,  the 
whole  world  was  sunny  and  shining. 

The  method  of  our  migration  was  very  different  from 
the  hand-to-mouth  way  in  which  I  had  been  progressing. 
I  was  now  part  of  a  dignified  parade.  Our  stoppings 
and  startings  were  now  ceremonies  of  note,  and  we  pro- 
ceeded among  the  population  with  all  the  stateliness 
of  an  army  on  the  march.  Our  party  consisted  of  the 
Bishop,  Lady,  Dorothy,  and  a  missionary,  who  served 
as  guide,  herald,  and  secretary,  with  the  addition  of 
sixteen  coolies  to  carry  our  five  sedan-chairs,  twenty 
coolies  to  convey  our  baggage,  bedding,  and  other  sup- 
plies— and  a  cook.  Of  these  the  cook  was  naturally  the 
most  important.  In  comparison  with  him  the  Bishop 
was  quite  secondary.  On  him  depended  our  peace,  our 
health,  and  indeed  our  very  lives,  and  our  itinerary  was 
partly  determined  by  the  necessity  of  levying  a  tax  of 
chickens,  eggs,  and  rice  on  the  population,  to  further  his 
indispensable  ministrations.  He  was  a  sort  of  magician, 
however,  and  could  extract  a  dinner  of  many  courses 

39 


40  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

from  a  small  bowl  of  charcoal  as  easily  as  Aladdin  ac- 
quired jewels  by  rubbing  the  lamp. 

So  we  set  out  on  a  sunny  day  in  the  midst  of  the  sea- 
son of  rains.  The  whole  world  shone  with  a  dewy  fresh- 
ness and  luxuriance,  and  the  glitter  of  water  was  dif- 
fused like  sunshine  through  the  land.  Through  the 
young  rice  blades  the  breeze  rippled  with  a  soft  sound, 
as  of  the  faint  rustling  of  silk,  and  ruffled  the  water 
around  their  roots  into  twinkles  and  sparks  of  light. 
Here  and  there,  where  not  even  a  Chinese  farmer  could 
find  room  for  a  seed,  the  small  white  roses  took  courage 
and  bloomed,  hanging  their  trailing,  prickly  masses  of 
fragrance  on  every  dead  stump  and  jutting  rock,  and 
sweetening  the  sunshine. 

So  we  progressed  from  village  to  village  along  a  high- 
way which  was,  perhaps,  as  old  as  Christianity,  but 
which  consisted  only  of  a  narrow  footpath  roughly  paved 
with  stones,  and  worn  smooth  by  the  passing  of  many 
bare  feet.  In  nearly  every  village  we  stopped  for  social 
conversation  for  ourselves  and  rice  for  our  coolies. 
Usually  we  were  set  down  in  what  might  be  called  the 
Main  Street — a  crooked  little  alley  lined  with  counters 
and  tiny  open  shops,  like  a  primitive  edition  of  an  aisle 
in  Woolworth's.  There  the  press  of  human  life  was 
thickest  and  the  vermin  most  active.  There  the  fragrance 
of  the  mountain  sunshine  was  stifled  in  the  odours  of 
out-of-door  cook-shops,  and  of  debris  less  savoury,  and 
the  light  entered  among  the  low  roofs  only  in  stray  sun- 
beams which  seemed  all  alive  with  insects  and  dust  that 
danced  within  them.  But  sometimes  a  whole  counter 
of  newly  caught  fish  diffused  a  damp  coolness,  and  an 
odour  that  was  pleasant  because  it  was  clean.  Some- 
times a  whiff  of  temple  incense  blew  through  the  filthy 
shadows.  Or,  amidst  the  press  and  stench  of  life,  a 


THE  HERITAGE  OF  NOAH  41 

stone  image  of  Buddha  or  some  elder  god,  rough  hewn 
out  of  stone  centuries  and  centuries  ago,  stood  immu- 
table and  serene,  like  a  fossil  of  a  grander  day. 

Suddenly,  as  we  stopped  in  one  village,  the  sunshine 
went  out  like  an  electric  light  switched  off,  and  the 
heavens  opened.  I  saw  no  more  sunshine  in  South 
China. 

At  first  it  was  rather  interesting.  We  pushed  through 
blinding  streaks,  the  coolies  dripping  and  steaming  like 
rain-demons.  As  the  water  increased,  roads  became 
streams  and  mountain  brooks  widened  into  roaring 
rivers.  Into  these  the  coolies  plunged,  waist-high,  with 
us  in  chairs  on  their  backs,  while  the  floods  rippled  and 
splashed  around  us.  Even  Dorothy's  spirits  began  to 
wilt. 

"Marjorie,"  she  called,  "I'm  falling  into  this  river. 
I'm  drowning." 

"You  might  reflect  for  your  comfort,"  said  the  Bishop, 
"that  this  river  is  the  only  clean  thing  you'll  find  in 
China  to  fall  into." 

As  we  went  on,  the  water  accumulated  in  our  chairs. 
We  sat  in  puddles  with  our  feet  in  pools,  while  the 
chairs  spouted  water  like  shower-baths.  At  last  we 
came  to  a  village  where  two  missionaries  had  taken 
refuge.  Of  course  they  had  picked  out  the  cleanest  spot 
and  had  been  indulging  in  sanitary  activities,  but  their 
shelter  remained  a  vile  little  barn  with  a  dirt  floor. 
Stepping  over  a  sow  that  burrowed  in  the  mud,  we  were 
made  hilariously  welcome  by  the  refugees  and  invited 
to  afternoon  tea.  It  was  delicate  jasmine-flower  tea, 
served  with  rich  raisin-cakes  which  would  have  graced 
an  emperor's  tea-house.  We  perched  on  odds  and  ends 
of  Chinese  furniture,  and  drank  it  gleefully. 

When  our  hosts  tried  to  press  us  to  stay  and  spend 


42  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  night  there,  wrapped  in  our  rubber  blankets,  we 
decided  to  push  on  into  the  rainy  dusk.  About  mid- 
night we  hoped  to  come  to  the  house  of  a  Chinese  pastor 
who  could  offer  us  a  few  of  the  comforts  of  home.  So  we 
braved  the  terrors  of  the  night,  making  our  way  on 
foot  through  the  village  by  the  light  of  a  dim,  smoky 
lantern.  All  around  us  the  liquefied  filth  was  plunging 
and  roaring,  and  our  lives  seemed  to  depend  on  a  safe 
passage  from  one  slippery  stone  to  another.  Mean- 
while the  fleas  and  mosquitoes,  with  dampened  wings, 
settled  on  us  and  clung,  stickily  stinging. 

At  last  we  decided  to  make  some  use  of  the  watery 
element.  Coming  to  a  canal,  we  put  our  chairs  and 
coolies  on  one  canal-boat  and  ourselves  on  another.  Ours 
had  a  low  arched  roof  under  which  one  could  not  stand 
or  sit,  but  could  lie  down.  There  was  space  about  eight 
feet  square  in  which  to  dispose  of  ourselves  in  horizontal 
positions.  It  took  some  judicious  packing  to  stow  away 
five  people  in  this  area,  but  we  did  it  at  last,  half -sitting, 
half -reclining,  with  bent  heads,  close  as  dates  in  a  box, 
and  dripping  all  over  each  other. 

"This,"  said  the  Bishop,  "is  travelling  de  luxe." 

Toward  midnight  we  found  shelter  under  the  roof  of 
a  Chinese  pastor.  Next  morning,  at  five  o'clock,  we 
started  off  again  in  the  deluge.  We  ate  tiffin  in  a 
Chinese  house  with  an  audience  of  pigs,  chickens,  and 
steaming  Orientals.  In  the  afternoon  we  came  to  a 
Methodist  chapel  built  in  good  honest  western  style, 
more  sanitary  than  picturesque,  more  dry  than  beauti- 
ful. Never  did  anything  look  so  much  like  home.  With 
one  accord  we  sat  down  and  refused  to  go  farther. 
When  we  found  that  the  cook  had  preceded  us  and  had 
set  out  tea  for  us  in  tin  cups,  our  joy  knew  no  bounds. 

Then  there  arose  a  serious  question:  how  could  we 


THE  HERITAGE  OF  NOAH  43 

change  into  dry  clothes,  for  all  our  baggage  was  full  of 
water?  One  and  all  we  were  dripping  and  steaming  and 
fast  turning  the  dry  little  church  into  an  imitation  of  a 
bath-house.  Then,  with  a  blush,  Dorothy  produced  a 
sartorial  error.  We  had  given  her  our  dress  clothes  to 
be  preserved  for  us  in  Foochow,  all  wrapped  in  oiled 
paper.  By  mistake  they  had  been  packed  with  the  stuff 
for  inland  travelling.  She  had  been  carrying  them 
around  all  this  time,  and  exerting  all  the  ingenuity  of 
the  cook  to  keep  them  dry.  They  were  the  only  things 
that  were  not  as  wet  as  the  world  outside. 

With  delight  we  fell  upon  them  and  arrayed  ourselves 
in  attire  which  would  have  done  justice  to  a  society 
editor's  report  of  a  wedding.  The  Bishop  was  quite  dis- 
tinguished in  a  tropical  afternoon  costume  of  pongee; 
Dorothy  looked  prettier  than  ever  in  blue  taffeta;  and 
I  billowed  forth  in  georgette  cr£pe.  In  honour  of  our 
costumes  we  waxed  witty  and  elegant  and  conversed  in 
studied  small-talk,  though  the  Bishop  did  find  it  neces- 
sary to  announce  in  tones  of  episcopal  authority  that  one 
must  ignore  fleas  during  tea. 

As  the  rainy  afternoon  closed  upon  us,  our  hilarity 
grew  apace.  Even  the  cook  succumbed  and  produced, 
from  heaven  knows  where,  the  crowning  masterpiece  of 
his  sleight-of-hand  tricks — a  white  tablecloth.  We  had 
a  dinner  of  three  courses,  served  with  elegance  on  a 
wooden  box.  When  the  bowls  of  tomato  soup  appeared 
just  as  the  Bishop  bowed  his  head  to  say  grace,  Dorothy 
sang  out,  "Praise  Heinz  from  whom  all  blessings  flow," 
and  was  for  two  seconds  under  the  displeasure  of  the 
church.  The  rapturous  consumption  of  soup  was  fol- 
lowed by  baked  beans,  our  only  bread  being  rice.  We 
ended  with  tinned  cherries.  These  were  mathematically 
divided  between  us,  not  without  mutual  recriminations 


44  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

I 
and  heart-burnings.     The  missionary  sadly  remembers 

that  he  had  only  nineteen  cherries,  whereas  I  had 
twenty,  and  Dorothy's  shameless  appropriation  of 
twenty-one,  in  the  face  of  episcopal  protests,  remains  a 
crime  to  be  avenged  the  next  time  we  open  a  can  in  the 
wilderness. 

At  sunset  the  whole  sky  temporarily  cleared  in  a  mag- 
nificent flame  of  colour,  followed  almost  at  once  by  clear 
and  ringing  night,  which  after  a  few  hours  once  more 
dissolved  in  water.  But  for  a  little  while  the  world  was 
beautiful  with  the  light  of  the  stars. 

The  population  took  advantage  of  the  temporary 
clearing,  to  come  in  a  body  to  look  at  us.  Smoking, 
gesticulating,  infecting  the  sacred  atmosphere,  they 
gathered  into  the  little  church.  Still  luxuriously  con- 
scious of  our  own  washed,  perfumed,  and  silk-attired 
state,  we  felt  this  intrusion  to  be  peculiarly  obnoxious. 

"Get  out,  you  little  devils,"  said  Dorothy.  "Don't 
you  know  you  have  germs?  What  do  you  mean  by 
bringing  germs  into  the  house  of  the  Lord?" 

This  protest  being  ineffectual,  she  suddenly  had  an 
inspiration.  Slowly,  stealthily,  she  reached  for  her 
camera,  fixing  her  eye  on  them  sternly  the  while. 
Slowly,  stealthily,  she  turned  it  on  them,  shooting  out 
the  lens.  There  is  a  superstition  among  these  village 
Chinese  that  foreigners  steal  their  spirits  with  the 
camera,  and  whoever  is  photographed  will  shortly  fade 
away  and  die.  Scurrying,  screaming,  falling  over  each 
other,  our  callers  departed.  So  she  escorted  them  out, 
with  the  triumphant  air  of  the  Pied  Piper  of  Hamlin, 
and  they  were  seen  no  more. 

After  dinner  the  Bishop  held  a  meeting  of  native 
preachers  in  the  chapel.  For,  though  to  us  the  only 


THE  HERITAGE  OF  NOAH  45 

drama  of  those  days  was  the  drama  of  the  elements,  the 
Bishop's  most  temporary  abiding  place  was  the  focus 
of  human  struggle  and  aspiration.  Through  this  wilder- 
ness were  men  to  whom  he  stood  as  the  symbol  of  the 
most  vital  moment  of  their  lives — men  whom  he  had 
ordained,  men  whom  he  had  married,  men  whose  little 
ones  he  had  baptized,  men  with  whom  he  had  stood  in 
the  presence  of  death.  And  sometimes  they  came  a  long 
way  through  mud  and  rain  to  see  and  speak  with  him 
again.  There  was,  too,  a  good  deal  of  practical  business, 
and  a  kind  of  pastoral  research ;  for  bishops,  as  execu- 
tives of  the  church,  do  not  always  know  a  great  deal 
about  the  lives  of  simple  missionaries  and  Christians 
of  an  alien  race,  and  the  Bishop  had  dedicated  this 
itinerary  to  his  own  enlightenment.  But  most  of  all 
there  were  the  problems  of  conscience,  for  never  was  the 
conscience  of  the  Church  so  uneasy  as  in  those  closing 
days  of  the  war.  Into  even  the  most  remote  missionary 
compounds  the  questions  that  neither  war  nor  peace 
have  settled  had  come  to  trouble  men  whose  lives  had 
been  rooted  in  conceptions  which  did  not  easily  with- 
stand the  devastation  of  logic,  but  were  not,  for  that 
reason,  insufficient  to  a  useful  life.  In  particular  the 
young  Chinese  Christians  were  insistent.  There  was  so 
much  that  they  wanted  to  understand.  And  all  the 
while,  as  the  rain  poured,  and  the  fleas  performed, 
and  village  after  village  washed  past  us  in  the  deluge, 
the  Bishop  went  his  way  distributing  his  simple  gift  of 
peace  and  kindly  common  sense,  in  brief  conferences  in 
hovels  and  Chinese  inns,  and  even  in  the  red  courts  of 
the  Confucian  temples — going  through  the  ceremonies  of 
the  church,  if  not  with  fervour,  yet  always  with  dignity 
and  tenderness ;  inspiring  men  to  no  heights  of  martyr- 


46  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

dom,  perhaps,  but  unsnarling  their  immediate  troubles, 
and  leaving  them  with  cheer  and  courage  for  the  routine 
of  daily  service. 

So  now  he  was  to  end  this  exhausting  day  with  a  con- 
ference in  the  Methodist  chapel,  and  Dorothy  and  I  were 
banished  into  outer  darkness.  We  walked  up  and 
down  the  narrow  paved  path  in  the  churchyard.  It  was 
strange  and  still  and  lonely.  All  around  us  were  the 
solemn  outlines  of  the  hills ;  above  us  the  eager,  burning 
stars  of  the  southern  sky,  lighting  the  darkness  like 
passionate  living  things;  and  far  and  near,  in  every 
pool  and  rice-field,  rose  the  vibrant,  melancholy  chorus 
of  the  frogs.  I  thought  of  the  man  behind  the  blurred 
glow  of  the  chapel  window,  who  seemed  so  near  to  the 
pulse  of  a  new  life  in  this  ancient  land,  and  of  the  young 
Chinese  preachers  who  must  seem  to  themselves  ex- 
ponents of  a  great  new  cause,  professors  of  radical  doc- 
trines, heralds  of  the  future  of  their  people.  In  such  ef- 
fort, I  reflected,  with  its  eyes  always  on  the  future,  with 
something  to  be  done  to-morrow  which  seems  other  and 
greater  than  the  accomplishment  of  to-day,  lies  the 
secret  of  life,  and  no  one  who  is  borne  through  the  days 
on  such  a  current  of  energy  can  be  wholly  wretched. 
Then  I  thought  of  Lady,  to  whose  fastidious,  unventure- 
some  spirit  this  messy  way-faring  of  ours  was  misery. 
She  longed  only  to  vegetate  in  some  quiet  garden  of 
society,  with  her  few  beloved  ones  planted  securely,  like 
trees,  around  her.  Yet  she  had  found  a  motive  to  drag 
her  through  a  life  that  was  often  a  torture  to  soul  and 
sense  in  the  happiness  of  being  beside  her  husband. 
And  now,  though  we  were  banished,  she  sat  on  the  outer 
rim  of  his  little  conference,  quietly,  taking  no  part, 
with  her  eyes  upon  his  face.  Thinking  of  these  things, 
I  felt  the  intolerable  loneliness  of  youth  on  the  threshold 


H 


to 

~ 


to 

G 


47 

of  life,  a  sharer  neither  in  the  labor  nor  the  love  with 
which  I  journeyed.  At  that  minute  there  swelled  upon 
the  darkness  the  sound  of  singing — tenor  voices, 
strangely  keyed,  singing  "Abide  with  me/'  in  an  alien 
tongue. 

Dorothy  flung  her  arms  around  me.  "Marjorie,"  she 
whispered,  "I  could  just  weep  floods." 

Why,  I  did  not  ask.  Seventeen  needs  as  little  outward 
cause  for  its  floods  as  for  its  sunshine.  We  were  tired, 
nervous,  undeniably  home-sick.  Suddenly  Dorothy, 
catching  at  some  means  of  self-control,  said,  "Let's 
dance."  As  the  hymn  died  away  in  a  low  hum  that  must 
have  been  the  benediction,  she  whistled  a  one-step  to 
which  we  had  danced  at  home,  and  we  began  circling 
around  in  the  darkness,  on  the  narrow  path  of  that  little 
Methodist  churchyard  in  China,  beneath  the  burning 
alien  stars. 

"Girls !  Girls !"  said  a  scandalized  voice  from  the  door 
of  the  chapel.  "Dorothy!  And  while  your  father  is 
holding  a  service,  too." 

Submissively  we  yielded  and  went  to  tuck  our  two 
lonesome  selves  away  beneath  the  mosquito  netting  in 
the  little  upper  room  of  the  chapel,  which  had  been 
dedicated  to  our  use.  But  Dorothy,  sitting  upright  on 
her  canvas  cot,  her  head  in  the  darkness  making  a  kind 
of  white  dome  in  the  roof  of  her  netting,  looked  out  upon 
the  stars  in  an  unwonted  mood  of  sentiment  and  young 
poetry. 

"Might  be  the  eyes  of  angels,"  she  said,  "or  God  Him- 
self, for  that  matter,  with  a  thousand  eyes  like  a  pea- 
cock's tail.  Marjorie,  do  you  suppose  they  disap- 
proved ?" 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  GHOST  OF  THE  TEMPLE 

AT  least  we  were  not  narrow-minded  in  our  acceptance 
of  religious  hospitality.  Having  slept  in  a  Methodist 
chapel,  we  lunched  next  day  in  a  Buddhist  temple.  Some 
time  during  the  night  the  stars  had  vanished.  Sullen 
and  persistent  the  rain  poured  again  and  all  the  morn- 
ing we  had  set  our  faces  against  the  floods.  At  noon  we 
came  to  a  kind  of  scarlet  structure  that  glowed  like  a 
red  coal  in  the  gloom,  guarded  by  two  green  porcelain 
dragons  with  pink  eyes,  two  soldiers  in  yellow  uniforms, 
and  an  owl.  Priests  in  robes  of  dull  bronze  silk  came 
out,  and,  bowing  suavely,  invited  us  to  enter.  Chinese 
have  a  great  respect  for  rank  and  title.  The  Bishop, 
it  was  understood,  was  an  important  magistrate  of  the 
Christians.  The  exponents  of  a  rival  religion  asked  no 
more.  Their  temple  was  at  our  service. 

But  they  risked  no  personal  contamination.  As  soon 
as  we  were  comfortably  established,  those  mute,  courte- 
ous priests  vanished,  nor  did  we  see  the  face  of  one  of 
them  again.  But  the  temple  itself  seemed  hospitable 
enough.  Joyously  we  passed  through  a  cheerful  red 
pavilion,  well  paved  and  swept,  and  smelling  pleasantly 
of  incense,  into  an  inner  courtyard.  It  was  still  and  de- 
serted. Only  an  owl,  in  a  low  twisted  tree  of  enormous 
girth,  ruffled  its  wet  feathers  and  looked  at  us,  wink- 
ing; and  a  small  boy,  sitting  on  his  feet,  beneath  the 
roofed,  open  corridor  that  surrounded  this  inner  garden, 
contemplated  us  silently,  with  bland,  unblinking  eyes, 

48 


THE  GHOST  OP  THE  TEMPLE  49 

like  a  small  Buddha.  Taking  possession  of  a  portion 
of  the  outer  pavilion,  the  cook  spread  our  table  de- 
liciously  with  hot  soup,  rice,  and  tinned  meats.  Thus 
refreshed  with  what  in  that  place  was  most  sacrilegious 
nourishment,  we  wandered  for  a  while  in  the  dust  of 
the  inner  temple,  learning  the  immortal  future  of 
sinners  and  carnivori  like  ourselves.  For  the  orthodox 
Buddhist  is  a  vegetarian,  believing  all  sentient  crea- 
tures to  be  brothers,  and  the  taking  of  even  the  humblest 
life  to  be  murder  in  some  degree. 

As  in  most  Buddhist  temples  in  China,  there  was  a 
good  deal  amidst  the  dust  and  old  incense  of  the  place 
which  did  not  owe  its  origin  to  the  gentle  saint  of  India. 
In  the  centre  of  the  temple  was  a  great  golden  deity, 
massive,  paternal.  He  represented  the  fatherly  spirit  of 
Heaven,  greater  and  older  than  Gautama,  and  yielding 
nothing  to  him  in  worship.  He  was  guarded  by  ghastly 
blue  demons  with  six  arms,  not  properly  gods  of 
Buddhism,  which,  in  the  strictest  sense,  knows  no  God, 
but  regarded  as  such,  with  propitiatory  awe,  by  the  com- 
mon folk.  Here  and  there  in  the  corners  of  the  temple 
sat  Buddha  himself,  on  his  lotus  flower,  a  calm  golden 
image,  smooth  of  brow  and  heavy  lidded,  with  folded 
feet  and  slender  benedictory  hands,  remote  alike,  it 
seemed,  from  the  struggle  of  men  and  the  vengeance  and 
jealousy  of  the  gods.  All  around  these  great  idols, 
whose  golden  faces  glowed  in  the  dusk  with  a  kind  of 
ghostly  vitality,  stretched  the  landscape  of  Hell,  Pur- 
gatory, and  Paradise,  graphically  painted  upon  the 
walls. 

Of  the  three  departments  of  our  immortal  destiny, 
Hell  had  apparently  been  the  most  interesting  to  the 
artist.  With  the  satisfaction  of  one  who  knows  his  own 
future  secure,  he  depicted  the  throngs  of  men  who  stand 


50  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

feeble  and  trembling  before  the  open  gates  of  death. 
Within  those  gates  the  magistrate  of  the  underworld  sat 
enthroned,  and,  in  front  of  him,  at  a  little  desk,  sat  his 
secretary,  a  sour-looking  recording  angel,  who  stopped 
every  candidate  for  the  after-life  upon  the  threshold,  and 
looked  up  his  biography  in  the  files.  Those  who  had 
been  good  to  men,  and  better  to  animals,  passed  immedi- 
ately over  an  arched  bridge  to  Paradise,  turning  to  look 
with  Self-complacent  smirks  upon  those  who  were  not 
so  lucky.  Beneath  this  bridge  flowed  a  river  of  torture 
in  which  the  demons  were  already  dipping  the  guilty — 
a  sight  which  seemed  greatly  to  intensify  the  pure  joys 
of  those  who  had  not  known  sin. 

Since  Purgatory  was  merely  a  mild  and  temporary 
version  of  the  place  of  everlasting  pain,  the  artist  had 
naturally  devoted  his  best  strokes  to  Hell.  Thither  the 
guilty  were  borne  by  devils  with  pitch-forks,  who  looked 
like  own  brothers  to  some  of  the  same  race  who  cover 
with  their  infernal  pageantry  the  manuscripts  of  old 
illumined  monkish  volumes  of  the  Middle  Ages  in 
Europe.  Those  who  had  cheated  as  shop-keepers  in  the 
bazaar  were  crushed  under  the  heavy  balances  with 
whose  weight  they  had  tampered.  Those  who  had  lied, 
slandered,  borne  false  witness,  indulged  in  blasphemous 
or  licentious  speech,  or  had  otherwise  misused  their 
tongues  were  deprived  of  the  unruly  member  by  a  surgi- 
cal operation  designed,  like  the  punishment  of  Pro- 
metheus, to  last  through  all  eternity — or  at  least  until 
Hell  itself  shall  work  out  its  destiny  and  come  into  the 
ultimate  peace.  Thievery,  however,  did  not  fare  so 
badly.  At  the  last  minute  a  bald-pated  monk  with  a 
rosary  descended  from  Heaven  and  carried  the  sinner 
off  to  the  courts  of  peace — a  socialistic  monk,  appar- 


THE  GHOST  OF  THE  TEMPLE  51 

ently,  who  had  theories  about  the  rights  of  private 
property. 

But  the  most  detailed  punishments  were  reserved  for 
those  who,  like  ourselves,  at  our  late  repast,  had  made 
unlawful  use  of  animal  flesh.  Here  the  souls  were 
turned  over  to  the  spirits  of  the  beasts  whom  they  had 
wronged.  A  man  who  used  to  like  a  juicy  beef-steak 
now  and  then  was  being  decapitated  by  a  cow,  while 
another  cow,  standing  gracefully  on  her  hind  legs,  held 
before  him  a  mirror  which  showed  himself,  in  life,  in 
the  act  of  removing  a  bovine  head.  Apparently  a  pho- 
tograph of  the  crime  had  been  kept  for  his  confusion. 
Some  who  used  to  dine  on  frogs'  legs,  like  the  plutocrats 
in  New  York  hotels,  were  broiled  by  frogs  over  a  fire,  and 
were  beginning  to  curl  up  around  the  edges  and  become 
quite  tender,  to  the  delight  of  certain  frog-chefs,  who 
were  superintending  the  cookery  with  grins  of  anticipa- 
tion and  pleasure.  Meanwhile,  to  enforce  the  moral, 
an  incidental  sketch  showed  other  souls  blissfully  pro- 
ceeding up  the  heavenly  way  to  Paradise  on  the  backs 
of  the  grateful  birds  and  beasts  whom  they  never  ate. 

Purgatory,  being  not  quite  so  lively  a  place  as  Hell, 
was  treated  rather  more  sketchily,  and  Paradise  was 
dismissed  in  one  long  synthetic  panel  of  bliss,  which 
showed  a  great  company  of  the  blest  dining  with 
whiskered  archangels  in  Heaven.  Heaven  was  a  glori- 
fied Chinese  house,  with  a  bit  of  landscape  showing 
through  the  transparent  walls. 

As  we  were  about  to  go,  our  eye  was  caught  by  an 
image  of  a  woman  in  a  little  shrine  behind  a  big  Buddha, 
apparently  neglected,  and  startlingly  un-Chinese  in  con- 
ception and  treatment.  The  cook,  who  knew  every- 
thing, and  was,  besides,  a  Catholic,  crossed  himself  when 


52  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

he  saw  it,  and  murmured  "Mother  of  God."  The  Bishop 
examined  it  closely. 

"The  robe,"  he  said,  "is  the  robe  of  a  Syrian  woman, 
and  the  feet  are  bare,  while  all  the  saints  and  gods 
in  the  temple  wear  shoes.  And  see,"  he  added  thought- 
fully, "where  the  arms  are  broken  off  here,  it  is  almost 
as  if  she  had  held  a  child.  It  is  like  an  old,  old  image 
of  the  Madonna." 

The  cook,  closely  questioned  by  the  missionary,  was 
insistent.  The  Bishop  recalled  the  old  story  of  the 
Nestorian  missionaries  who,  in  the  seventh  century  after 
Christ,  came  overland  across  the  whole  expanse  of  Asia, 
and  converted  even  the  emperor  to  their  faith. 

"But  I  believe  their  ministrations  were  mostly  con- 
fined to  the  North,"  he  added,  "though  there  is  a  good 
deal  of  Catholicism  in  China,  some  of  it  very  ancient  and 
superstitious.  Many  of  the  river  folk  are  Catholics  and 
carry  an  image  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  along  with  the  eyes 
painted  on  the  outside  of  their  boats,  to  scare  off  the 
demons." 

Afterwards  this  mysterious  image  troubled  and 
haunted  me,  as  did  so  much  in  these  musty  old  temples. 
They  were  like  torn  pages  of  books  which  one  could  read 
only  in  snatches.  Their  immeasurable  age  seemed  to 
carry  the  imagination  back  through  spaces  of  ghostly 
time  which  the  Occidental  traverses  with  a  kind  of 
terror,  like  a  child  walking  among  grave-stones  at  night. 
And,  in  the  Buddhist  temples  in  particular,  there  seemed 
often  a  kind  of  parody  of  things  long  dear  to  western 
Christianity.  This  strange  resemblance  was  felt  even 
by  the  friars  and  Jesuit  priests  who  first  brought  the 
faith  of  Jesus  to  China,  and  they  were  troubled  by  it. 
But  they  laid  it  to  the  devil's  talent  for  caricature. 

That  night,  while  the  wind-swept  rain  howled  round 


THE  GHOST  OF  THE  TEMPLE  53 

the  shack  where  we  snatched  a  few  minutes  of  dry  sleep, 
I  thought  of  the  temple,  and  its  resemblance  to  things 
of  Christian  antiquity.  Is  it,  I  thought,  that  the  trail 
of  those  Christian  missionaries  fourteen  centuries  ago, 
before  our  own  forefathers  had  wholly  forgotten  Thor 
and  Woden,  does  veritably  lead  through  the  Buddhist 
hell  to  the  bare  feet  of  the  Syrian  Mary?  Is  it  that  both 
religions,  the  faith  of  the  East  and  the  faith  of  the  West, 
inherit  at  least  their  manners  and  their  pageantry  from 
the  same  ancestor,  and  have  more  in  common  than  men 
have  dreamed?  Buddhism  seems  always  an  alien  thing 
in  China,  suggestive  of  another  home  and  other  usages. 
Often  the  placid  face  of  Gautama  himself  seems  lost 
behind  the  native  gods  and  demons  which  the  imagina- 
tion of  the  people  has  brought  in  to  fill  the  ghostly 
vacuums  of  the  religion  which  knows  no  God  but  only 
the  crescent  purity  of  the  aspiring  soul.  But  the  faith, 
all  corrupted  as  it  is,  carries  with  it  reminiscences  of 
its  home  in  India,  and  intimations  of  inexplicable  con- 
tacts. And  through  its  temples  and  shrines  there  seems 
often  to  flutter  a  stranger  ghost — the  ghost  of  an  old 
Catholicism. 


CHAPTER  VII 

INFANT   CASUALTIES 

THE  latter  part  of  our  journey  lay  through  a  wild  coun- 
try of  sand  and  rocks  and  sea,  girdled  with  towering, 
tiger-haunted  hills.  Beyond  these  we  came  to  the  brim- 
ming topaz  floods  of  the  Ming  Kiver  just  in  time  to  at- 
tach our  house-boats  to  a  passing  launch  and  speed 
home  on  borrowed  steam  to  the  dripping  docks  of  Foo- 
chow.  There  among  the  wet  palms  and  white  lilies  of 
the  compound,  the  electric  lights  were  shining,  and  little 
white  children,  as  fair  to  our  eyes  as  nursery  pets 
of  Paradise,  ran  out  to  greet  us,  and  held  up  their  fresh 
little  faces  to  be  kissed.  And  there  we  luxuriated  for  a 
week  in  the  miracle  of  civilized  life  and  the  peace  of 
its  humdrum  ways. 

Swinging  up  and  down  the  terraces  of  Foochow,  with 
rain  curtains  drawn  close,  Dorothy  and  I  learned  little 
of  that  mossy  old  city  except  its  smells,  though  Dorothy 
did  announce  that  streets  were  "all  dirt  and  yard  wide." 
But  we  found  a  feudal  charm  and  dignity  in  the  life  of 
the  foreign  community  into  the  midst  of  which  we  had 
been  received.  Like  the  predatory  lords  who  imposed 
themselves  on  the  alien  populations  of  France,  England, 
and  Northern  Italy  in  the  Middle  Ages,  the  white  men  in 
China  live  a  stately  life,  lords  of  many  servants,  self- 
conscious  and  self -inclosed  within  the  narrow  bounds  of 
their  own  society  and  culture.  Beneath  the  tall  many- 
verandaed  homes  of  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  and  Christian  col- 
leges, so  graciously  set  amidst  lawns  and  fenced  off  by 

54 


INFANT  CASUALTIES  55 

walls,  the  small  native  houses  seem  to  cling  to  the  hill- 
like  tenantry  beneath  a  twelfth-century  castle.  If  it  be 
the  property  of  poetry,  as  Shelley  says,  to  make  the  fa- 
miliar be  as  if  it  were  not  familiar,  the  humblest  exile 
from  Hoboken  or  Kalainazoo  who  comes  out  to  China  to 
sell  phonographs  or  give  away  the  gospel  may  take  to 
himself  a  little  of  that  grace. 

Amidst  the  foreigners — who,  stripped  of  their  Ori- 
ental halos,  are  merely  an  international  collection  of 
traders,  consuls,  and  missionaries,  all  united  in  the 
bonds  of  brotherhood  by  common  and  passionate  hatred 
of  the  Japanese — Dorothy  and  I  made  our  own  appro- 
priate discoveries.  Dorothy  discovered  Harold,  and  I 
discovered  the  Infant  Casualty.  Two  Infant  Casualties 
they  were,  in  fact,  for  the  wreckage  Dorothy  was  mak- 
ing about  her  had  little  in  it  of  maturity. 

As  soon  as  we  arrived,  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  had  reopened 
negotiations  in  the  person  of  Harold. 

Harold  had  been  a  good  boy  in  a  small  American  town, 
and  he  had  transferred  to  China  all  the  ideas  and  man- 
nerisms that  belonged  to  him  as  such,  without  visible 
alteration  in  transit.  He  had  an  innate  but  not  of- 
fensive consciousness  of  superiority,  inasmuch  as  in  his 
own  group  he  had  always  been  a  leader  and  he  knew, 
in  consequence,  that  it  is  "personality"  that  counts  in 
life.  He  had  been  the  editor  of  his  school  paper,  vice- 
president  of  his  class  in  a  small  denominational  college, 
and  president  of  the  Christian  Endeavour  Society  as  often 
as  he  would  let  himself  be  elected.  He  thought  the  atti- 
tude of  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  rather  too  strict  on  the  subject 
of  amusements ;  was  sure  that  a  man  could  be  a  Christian 
without  being  a  prig ;  expressed  his  aspirations  in  terms 
of  the  word  service,  rather  than  salvation;  and  made  a 
virtue  of  certain  promises  to  his  mother,  to  whom  he 


56  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

wrote  twice  a  week.  His  favourite  poem  was  Kipling's 
If,  an  illuminated  copy  of  which  adorned  the  wall  of  his 
study  where  we  took  tea  with  him  one  day,  along  with 
a  copy  of  Hoffman's  boy  Christ  among  the  Pharisees, 
a  pretty  girl  in  sport  clothes,  drawn  by  Neysa  McMein, 
and  photographs  of  all  his  family.  The  author  that  he 
thought  he  ought  to  like,  and  did  really  like  in  his  more 
exalted  and  intellectual  moments,  was  Henry  Van  Dyke, 
but  for  ordinary  purposes  he  preferred  the  belated  copies 
of  the  Saturday  Evening  Post  which  strayed  into  Foo- 
chow  now  and  then  via  the  South  China  merchant 
line. 

He  spent  much  of  his  spare  time  on  the  veranda  of 
the  house  where  Dorothy  was  staying,  remarking,  to 
her  annoyance,  that  he  liked  to  go  there  to  play  with 
the  kids,  the  only  other  kid  being  a  curly-headed  midget 
of  three.  Whereupon  Dorothy,  half  teasing  and  half 
challenging,  adopted  herself  into  his  family  as  his 
"sister,"  assuming  all  the  prerogatives  of  kinship.  Once 
when  she  captured  his  book  of  snapshots,  and  pursued 
him  with  persistent  and  public  questions  about  all  the 
faces  of  all  the  girls  therein,  I  heard  him  exclaim,  "Cut 
it  out,  Dorothy.  Gee,  and  to  think  that  I  prayed  for  a 
little  sister  once!" 

Dorothy,  of  course,  as  she  often  said,  never  intended 
to  marry,  and  had  put  the  ordinary  foolishness  of  mate- 
hunting  maidens  quite  out  of  her  life.  She  intended  to 
devote  herself  to  a  career,  though  she  had  not  yet  de- 
cided whether  it  would  be  as  a  surgeon  or  a  prima  donna. 
But  meanwhile  she  saw  a  chance  of  doing  good  in  the 
world  by  a  supervisory  regard  for  Harold's  conscience, 
appearance,  and  manners,  and  sometimes  she  even  con- 
descended to  that  pretty  air  of  wifely  co-operation  which 
is  more  characteristic  of  affairs  of  this  sort  before  the 


INFANT  CASUALTIES  r>7 

age  of  twenty  than  afterwards.  When  Harold  wrote 
his  bi-weekly  letter  to  his  mother,  she  would  sit  by  him, 
cross-legged  on  the  floor  of  the  veranda,  and  would  add 
postscripts  and  wishes  of  good  health.  When  he  wrote 
to  his  bachelor  brother,  these  additions  w^ould  grow 
rather  longer  and  more  vivacious,  and  she  would  even 
permit  Harold  to  add  a  snapshot  of  herself.  She  was 
especially  solicitous  about  the  correspondence  with  the 
"girl  back  home,"  to  whom  she  always  sent  the  friend- 
liest of  greetings.  Inferring  that  there  must  be  a  pic- 
ture of  this  damsel  extant,  she  cordially  invited  Harold 
to  bring  it  over.  He  accepted  the  invitation — poor  fatu- 
ous youth!  After  commenting  on  it  with  studied  gen- 
erosity, she  coolly  absconded  with  it.  Nor  did  all  his 
entreaties  prevail  to  recover  the  prize.  She  said  she 
liked  it  so  much  that  she  was  keeping  it  for  a  while. 

While  Dorothy  was  thus  preoccupied,  I  discovered 
the  Infant  Casualty. 

We  called  him  the  Infant  Casualty  because  he  had 
been  killed  in  a  mock  European  war  held  by  the  little 
boys  at  the  Anglican  School  for  the  Blind.  I  mention 
him  only  as  a  prelude  to  a  tale  of  gore  which  had  some- 
thing less  of  grace  about  it. 

When  his  corpse  was  found  upon  the  battle-field,  he 
wTas  promptly  resurrected  by  a  Red  Cross  physician,  also 
Chinese,  and  very  small  and  blind.  So  impressed  was 
he  by  his  own  revival  that  he  insisted  that,  thereafter, 
he  must  be  a  Red  Cross  physician,  too.  So  the  next  time 
they  played  European  War,  in  the  little  courtyard  sur- 
rounded by  the  shops  where  they  were  learning  trades 
for  self-support,  he  appeared  in  a  white  uniform  and 
a  hat  adorned  with  the  Red  Cross.  He  could  not 
see  his  own  glory,  nor  could  his  blind  companions,  but 
he  was  just  as  pleased  as  any  little  boy  with  eyes.  And 


58  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

I,  to  whom  this  charming  school,  set  in  the  damp 
fragrance  of  mountain  lilies  for  all  the  world  like  our 
annunciation  lilies  of  Easter  time,  was  the  most  delight- 
ful retreat  in  Foochow,  found  the  meek  little  yellow  face 
in  the  midst  of  this  snowy  regalia  quite  irresistible. 
"Mother,"  the  plump,  warm-hearted  British  woman  in 
charge  of  the  school,  had  said  that  their  battles  might 
be  as  mock  as  they  pleased,  but  the  life-saving  must  be 
real.  So  she  had  made  the  game  a  genuine  course  in 
first  aid.  In  time  the  Infant  Casualty's  vague  little 
hands  grew  really  skilful,  and  he  knew  many  things 
about  first  aid  which  are  not  known  to  little  American 
boys  with  eyes. 

Great  and  terrible  were  those  battles  in  which  the 
Infant  Casualty  officiated.  There  was  stirring  music 
by  the  school  band.  The  two  sides  rushed  together,  not 
fiercely  like  little  boys  who  can  see,  but  groping  a  little 
with  their  hands.  They  met.  They  fell  in  a  heap,  with 
groans  and  shouts  and  giggles.  Suddenly,  as  things 
grew  desperate,  the  Ked  Cross  would  charge  upon  them 
and  dramatically  save  the  lives  of  everybody. 

One  day  while  I  was  watching  this  perennial  perform- 
ance, one  little  soldier  really  got  hurt.  It  was  just  a 
sprained  ankle  and  a  bruised  arm.  The  Infant  Casualty 
rose  to  the  occasion  and  doctored  him  like  a  professional. 
It  was  his  first  real  case.  For  the  moment  he  was  a  hero, 
and  all  the  armies  acclaimed  him.  He  began  to  boast 
of  his  future  prowess  as  a  mature  practitioner. 

We  left  him  lording  it  over  the  courtyard  and  his 
admiring  companions.  Meanwhile  there  was  music  in 
the  chapel,  and  Mother  and  I  rested  there  a  moment,  to 
chat  quietly  outside  of  the  reach  of  the  children.  One 
little  blind  boy  was  playing  the  organ  while  another 
sang  in  English : 


INFANT  CASUALTIES  59 

Sunset  and  evening  star 

And  one  clear  call  for  me ; 
And  may  there  be  no  moaning  of  the  bar 

When  I  put  out  to  sea. 

Clear  and  sweet — and  a  little  melancholy — the  boy 
soprano  rang  out.  What  it  meant  to  him  I  do  not  know, 
perhaps  only  what  the  song  means  to  the  bird.  There 
was  something  odd  and  haunting  in  the  pitch  of  his 
voice,  something  quaint  in  the  pronunciation  of  the 
English  words.  He  sang,  it  seemed,  with  all  his  heart, 
straining  an  eager  little  face  against  the  curtain  of  his 
darkness,  carried  along  on  the  current  of  his  own 
melody. 

The  door  opened.  In  came  the  Infant  Casualty, 
groping  his  way  to  the  music.  His  face  was  a  little 
pallid  and  tired,  all  the  triumph  gone  out  of  it.  As  he 
felt  his  way  toward  the  singer,  he  suddenly  touched 
something  large,  soft,  and  warm.  A  lap,  a  capacious, 
warm  lap !  With  a  sigh  of  weariness  he  clambered  into 
it,  and  laid  his  head  on  her  shoulders.  "Mother"  put 
her  arms  around  him.  A  look  of  unutterable  comfort 
overspread  his  face,  and  his  body  relaxed  into  stillness. 
There  may  be  such  a  thing  as  Oriental  stoicism,  and  the 
glory  of  medicine  is  very  great — but  for  him,  he  was 
only  a  little  boy,  and  arms  like  that  were  a  good  place 
in  which  to  sleep. 

In  such  simplicities  the  days  at  Foochow  passed  by, 
and  still  the  waters  walled  us  from  the  world,  and  the 
fogs  rose  daily  in  lieu  of  the  sun,  and  strangled  every 
venture. 


CHAPTER  VIII 


ONE  morning  out  of  the  mists  there  came  a  little  ship. 
How  she  docked  I  do  not  know,  for  the  river  was  a 
flood;  but  there  she  was,  cheerful  and  pert,  inviting 
him  who  would  to  rent  half  a  mouldy  cabin.  No  prize, 
indeed,  but  I  was  bored  and  missionary  enterprises 
dragged.  So  it  happened  that  I  was  floating  off  into 
the  fogs,  alone  and  unchaperoned,  with  many  promises 
to  meet  the  Bishop  and  Dorothy  again  in  some  corner 
of  the  North — Shanghai,  perhaps,  or  Peking,  or  Korea. 

Slipping  out  of  the  rain,  but  not  out  of  the  mists,  we 
made  a  preliminary  detour  to  the  south  to  collect  some 
cargo,  and  came  into  another  river  and  the  harbour  of 
another  little  town. . 

It  was  really  a  most  innocent  looking  town.  Washed 
by  the  floods  of  a  misty  blue  river,  folded  in  by  blue  hills 
where  generations  of  ancestors  slept  in  grassy  graves, 
and  where  sometimes  a  flock  of  white  birds  would  pass, 
like  magnolia  flowers  borne  on  the  breeze,  it  seemed  a 
refuge  from  wars  and  revolutions  and  all  the  strife  of 
the  world.  What  matter  how  the  negotiations  proceeded 
between  the  two  Chinese  governments  at  Canton  and 
Peking ;  what  matter  what  the  young  lions  of  the  China 
press  reported  of  the  sayings  of  Doctor  Sun  Yat-sen, 
the  southern  intellectual,  and  what  the  man  in  Peking 
who  said  he  was  president  of  China,  replied?  What 
matter  even  if  that  northern  general  did  say  he  was  com- 
ing down  to  give  these  southern  bandits  something  to 

60 


A  GORY  CONCLUSION  61. 

use  their  old  guns  on.  What  matter  even  if  the  Japan- 
ese looking  jealously  across  from  Formosa  to  these  lovely 
shores,  should  come  and  take  a  hill  or  two  as  a  good 
place  to  plant  a  cannon?  What  matter  if  the  poison 
they  relentlessly  injected  was  eating  the  life  out  of  a 
people  once  so  great?  Here  the  lives  of  men  seemed  to 
move  in  bland  unconcern  among  the  springing  rice,  and 
the  city  seemed  to  wear  the  mists  and  the  verdure  of  the 
hills  as  armour  against  noise  and  warfare.  The  only 
stirring  thing  about  the  place  was  our  ship,  except,  of 
course,  the  gambling  hells.  A  few  junks  drifted  in  from 
upstream.  Quaint,  clumsy  boats  they  were,  well- 
guarded  with  such  angels  and  ministers  of  grace  as 
are  known  to  the  Chinese,  with  those  great  eyes  that 
keep  watch  upon  the  river-world  painted  upon  their 
prows. 

Sometimes  ingenious  saffron  beings  from  these  ships 
would  board  ours  with  handicrafts  of  China  done  up  in 
linen  sheets.  The  sheets  would  fall  apart.  There  was 
the  silk  lacquer  of  Foochow,  delicate  as  bubbles  and  col- 
oured like  gems.  There  was  brass  that  sounded  like 
sweet  bells,  and  tea-spoons  beautifully  fashioned  out  of 
soft  white  silver.  There,  too,  was  the  lovely  embroidery 
of  Swatow,  infinitely  patient  and  delicate.  The  pro- 
prietors of  these  pretty  things  bowed,  gesticulated, 
smiled,  and  scattered  a  few  words  of  English,  and  the 
distribution  of  my  petty  cash  among  them  became  a 
drama  that  I  was  loth  to  cut  short.  So  they  took  pos- 
session of  our  deck  and  squatted  there  all  day,  with  their 
gleaming  treasures  spread  out  on  the  sheets  before  them. 

Besides  these  obliging  venders  there  were  only  two 
other  phenomena  to  engage  our  attention  during  the 
thirty -six  hours  we  spent  in  that  river.  One  was  a  mys- 
terious figure  in  white  who  appeared  on  shore  and 


62  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

seemed  to  be  scraping  or  digging  in  the  ground.  On 
the  night  of  our  arrival  he  worked  far  into  the  dusk, 
his  white  garments  gleaming  like  the  raiment  of  some 
ghostly  grave-digger.  White  is  the  colour  of  mourning 
in  China,  and  so  rare  among  the  costumes  of  the  usual 
throngs  that  it  sets  its  wearer  off  with  melancholy  dis- 
tinction. Once  or  twice  when  we  questioned  the  venders 
about  this  personage,  they  grew  embarrassed  and  said 
nothing,  only  looking  at  us  and  at  the  moving  gleam  of 
white  on  shore,  with  that  terrible  smile  with  which  the 
Oriental  hides  his  sorrow  and  his  secrets. 

The  other  excitement  of  the  town  was  the  music  of  the 
gambling  hells.  It  went  on  all  day,  an  outrageous 
babel  of  sound.  It  resembled  bagpipes  playing  no  tune 
in  particular  to  the  accompaniment  of  a  lively  beating 
of  tin  pans.  Sometimes  the  music  was  interrupted  with 
shots.  These  we  took  to  be  merely  part  of  the  general 
entertainment,  like  the  noise  of  Fourth  of  July. 

After  we  had  exhausted  the  possibilities  of  the  land- 
scape, the  junks,  the  venders,  and  the  ghostly  wearer  of 
white  raiment,  we  visited  the  gambling  hells.  They  did 
not  look  like  haunts  of  vice.  They  were  camouflaged  in 
fluttering,  multicoloured  tissue-paper  covered  with 
hieroglyphics.  From  carved  galleries  projecting  over 
the  streets  cheerful  people  looked  down  upon  us. 

We  entered  the  most  select  of  these  places.  It  was 
clean,  or  rather  not  particularly  unclean.  All  about 
there  was  a  certain  amount  of  carved  furniture  and 
some  very  fine  porcelain  jars.  On  the  walls  were  atro- 
cious imitations  of  foreign  lithographs  representing  Chi- 
nese maidens  in  trousers — rouged,  smirking,  shameless. 
Around  a  fan-tan  table  was  gathered  a  great  crowd  of 
coolies  in  blue,  interspersed  with  a  sprinkling  of  portly 
gentlemen  in  black  brocaded  silk.  The  proprietor  came 


A  GORY  CONCLUSION  63 

to  greet  us.  Top-side  people  like  us,  it  seemed,  did  not 
belong  in  those  nether  regions.  At  that  minute  a 
swinging  basket  full  of  money  descended  from  the  ceil- 
ing. We  looked  up.  There,  peering  down  through  a 
hole  in  the  roof,  were  faces  and  faces.  They  belonged 
to  the  elite — those  who  would  not  condescend  to  gamble 
on  the  same  level  with  the  proletariat. 

This  company  of  the  select  we  joined  and  looked  down 
upon  the  multitude.  Plutocrat  and  beggar  alike  were 
bland  and  cheerful  gamblers.  Here  and  there  a  face 
looked  strained ;  but  there  was  not  the  obvious  gambler's 
passion  that  one  sees,  for  instance,  in  a  Filipino  cock- 
pit. Many  of  them  risked  their  last  penny  quite  blithely. 
There  was  a  vague  odour  of  opium  about  the  place,  but 
no  one  seemed  to  be  doped. 

Then  came  the  shots.  The  gamblers  merely  glanced 
at  each  other  as  much  as  to  say,  "Another  one,"  and  re- 
turned to  the  fan-tan. 

"What  is  it?"  I  asked.    "A  man  killed?" 

"Not  one,"  answered  a  man  who  spoke  a  little  English 
indifferently.  "Two-three-four — maybe  ten." 

"Why?" 

"Me  not  know.  To-day  live;  to-morrow  die.  War  in 
China." 

"Is  there  war  here,  in  this  town?" 

"To-day  here,  to-mo'rrow,  other  places." 

"Do  you  mean  to  say  that  men  are  being  killed  all 
around  you,  and  you  pay  no  attention?" 

"China  bad  country.  Once  good,  now  bad.  Many 
men  kill." 

Thereupon  he  returned  to  his  fan-tan,  and  I  could 
elicit  no  further  information. 

More  shots!  The  Chinese  were  impassive.  "Prob- 
ably soldiers  practising,"  we  said. 


64 

We  returned  to  our  ship  on  the  misty  blue  river.  The 
ingenious  saffron  beings  were  in  full  possession  of  the 
deck.  Suddenly  they  seemed  to  stiffen.  One  of  them 
pointed  to  a  procession  approaching  on  shore,  a  dejected 
rabble  led  by  a  squadron  of  soldiers. 

"In  this  place  much  shooting,"  he  said,  with  that 
ghastly  smile  whose  meaning  in  the  Orient  one  quickly 
comes  to  know.  I  looked  at  him  closely.  It  was  odd: 
he  looked  to  me  like  the  man  I  had  talked  to  in  the  gam- 
bling hell. 

The  Captain  explained  rapidly  in  a  low  voice:  "I've 
learned  about  these  fellows  on  board.  They  are  revolu- 
tionists. At  least  they  belong  to  the  party  that  isn't 
ruling  in  this  town  now,  whatever  that  may  mean. 
There's  no  real  government  in  these  southern  provinces, 
you  know,  though  there  are  a  lot  of  radicals,  malcon- 
tents, and  idealists  in  Canton  who  are  trying  to  make 
one  with  the  help  of  the  Japanese.  A  lot  of  the  party 
to  which  these  men  belong  have  been  captured.  I  don't 
know  what  they  want.  They  are  only  pretending  to  be 
merchants  from  another  town." 

"What  are  you  going  to  do  about  it?" 

"Nothing,"  said  he.    "It's  not  my  quarrel." 

Then  he  lifted  his  glass.  "What  is  happening  on 
shore?"  he  exclaimed. 

I  lifted  my  glass  also,  though  a  moment  later  I  wished 
that  I  had  not.  At  a  signal  from  the  soldiers  the  de- 
jected looking  rabble  lined  up  against  the  godown.  The 
soldiers  lifted  their  guns.  There  was  a  report.  The 
line  of  men  fell  limp,  crumpled  like  rag  dolls.  They 
were  all  dead.  It  was  so  rapid,  so  matter-of-fact,  so 
sordid!  A  wave  of  horror  and  sickness  passed  over  me 
—a  feeling  impossible  to  describe,  in  its  crude,  brute 
disgust — as  if  some  wall  of  inner  control  were  broken 


A  GORY  CONCLUSION  05 

by  the  sight,  and,  in  that  momentary  hysteria,  the  very 
dregs  and  sewerage  of  unconscious  life  were  washing 
unchecked  over  the  helpless  soul. 

The  soldiers  passed  on.  Creatures  in  white  lifted  the 
bodies  and  placed  them  in  white  boxes.  Then,  lifting 
these  coffins  on  their  shoulders,  in  the  same  business- 
like way  in  which  the  soldiers  had  despatched  lives,  they, 
too,  walked  on. 

When  we  turned,  we  found  our  decks  empty  of  all 
but  us.  The  ingenious  saffron  beings  had  vanished,  in- 
cluding my  friend  of  the  gambling  hell.  Had  they  used 
our  ship  as  a  means  of  seeing  the  execution?  We  did 
not  know.  Afar  on  the  river  we  saw  the  outlines  of  their 
fleeing  junks.  Then,  in  the  twilight  that  man  re-ap- 
peared whose  white  form  the  shadows  called  forth 
nightly.  When  our  ship  sailed  down  the  river,  on  its 
way  out  to  sea,  we  saw  him  still,  a  lonely,  indefatigable 
figure.  We  knew  his  function  now.  It  was  his  business 
to  spread  lime  over  the  bloody  spot  where  the  dead  had 

fallen. 

******* 

So  we  slipped  into  the  swinging  seas  of  the  China 
coast,  with  much  to  dream  of  and  much  more  to  see 
among  the  bamboos  and  golden-roofed  palaces  to  the 
north.  My  days  of  apprenticeship  in  Oriental  travel- 
ling were  over,  and  paths  of  more  independent  adven- 
ture were  opening  before  me.  But  of  this  I  was  not  yet 
aware;  for  crises  do  not  often  announce  themselves  in 
our  life.  They  come  quietly  amidst  a  welter  of  small 
events,  and  it  is  only  afterwards  that  we  see  clearly  the 
pattern  of  our  days. 


BOOK  TWO 


CHAPTER  IX 

AN   ALUMNAE   REUNION 

I  WAS  alone  in  Shanghai.  Somewhere  in  the  hot  mists 
of  Fukien,  Dorothy  was  breaking  the  heart  of  the 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  Beatrice,  the  lady  of  India,  and  the  com- 
rade Japan  gave  to  me  for  life  were  as  yet  unmet.  It 
was  just  a  dirty,  busy  city  that  held  no  friends  for  me. 
How  could  I  perceive  that  this  was  but  the  threshold 
of  experience,  or  guess  the  sweetness  that  time  treasured 
for  me  against  my  coming  into  places  whose  names,  as 
yet,  I  scarcely  knew? 

Yet,  as  I  look  back  upon  the  solitary  interim  between 
my  parting  with  Dorothy  and  her  dear  daily  foolishness, 
and  the  beginning  of  the  chain  of  events  that  forms  the 
somewhat  belated  plot  of  this  book,  I  see  a  gallery  of 
strange  womanly  figures — Cinderella  and  the  Outlaw 
Brides,  and  lastly  one  who  comes  in  all  the  regalia  of 
queenship.  Like  the  Sphinxes  that  stand  in  a  long  pro- 
cession before  an  Egyptian  temple,  they  guard  the  por- 
tals of  my  story;  nor  would  it  be  quite  complete  with- 
out the  shadow  of  their  darker  loves. 

But  those  first  days  in  Shanghai  no  friendly  face  of  a 
daughter  of  Eve  presented  itself  and  I  saw  the  life  of  the 
city  alone.  By  day  it  was  uninteresting  enough — hy- 
brid, and  noisy,  and  hot.  But  at  night  it  would  bloom 
into  gaiety.  Upper  stories  and  balconies,  unobtrusive 
by  day,  sprang  into  life  and  light  and  music.  Chinese 
gentlemen  arrayed  in  long  grey  silk  robes,  short  black 
silk  jackets,  and  occidental  straw  hats  walked  by,  wav- 

69 


TO  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

ing  fans.  Emancipated  Chinese  flappers  in  blue  silk 
trousers  and  pink  hair  ribbons  promenaded  by  twos 
and  threes,  giggling,  chattering,  and  looking  not  unpre- 
pared for  flirtation  in  occidental  style.  The  Chinese 
branch  of  the  Grundy  family  has  its  own  trials  with 
"these  wild  young  people"  these  days,  and  suffers  quite 
as  keenly  as  other  scandalized  elders  of  our  day.  So 
desperate  has  the  conduct  of  young  women  become  that 
the  Commissioner  of  Education  in  Shanghai  has  found 
it  necessary  to  make  a  rule  that  no  flapper  shall  bob  her 
hair  or  marry  without  her  parents'  consent. 

Through  the  narrow  streets,  beneath  the  blazing  bal- 
conies and  the  swinging  hieroglyphic  signs,  the  crowds 
surged  in  a  steady  rhythmical  current,  murmurous,  smil- 
ing, intent,  their  goal  of  pleasure  casting  anticipatory 
gleams  of  brightness  over  their  faces  and  even  the  silks 
of  their  dress.  And  the  chorus  of  their  myriad  voices, 
the  t-rrrrrr  of  the  rickshaw  bells,  the  honk  honk  of  the 
automobiles,  the  screams  of  the  coolies,  and  the  curses 
of  the  Sikhs,  were  all  caught,  as  it  were,  in  the  barbar- 
ous swirl  of  the  tea-house  music  which  harmonized 
all  to  its  own  dissonance.  Meanwhile  from  every 
cook  shop  and  kitchen  the  odours  of  cookery  steamed 
upon  the  evening  air,  as  if  the  whole  metropolis  were 
one  vast  chop  suey. 

Sometimes — on  night-ventures — my  taste  led  me  to 
a  place  where  the  old  Chinese  drama  competed  stri- 
dently with  the  counterfeits  of  the  present.  Here,  on 
a  long  bare  stage,  the  Tai  Ping  rebellion  was  being 
enacted  among  imaginary  hills  and  valleys  with  a 
great  prancing  of  invisible  horses.  For  an  old  Chi- 
nese play  calls  for  the  exercise  of  that  airy  faculty 
which  Shakespeare  invoked,  and  the  fashioning  of 
all  properties  and  trappings  out  of  the  treasures  of 


AN  ALUMNAE  KEUNION  71 

the  mind.  The  scenery  is  indicated  through  the  ac- 
tions of  the  characters.  A  certain  kind  of  walk  shows 
that  the  characters  are  climbing  hills,  in  which  case 
you  supply  a  mountain  landscape  out  of  your  own 
imagination.  An  outward  swing  of  the  leg  implies 
that  a  man  is  mounting  a  horse  and  riding  off.  It  is 
astonishing  how  quickly  the  mind  makes  the  neces- 
sary adjustment,  supplying  all  the  form  and  splen- 
dour of  imagined  scenery  almost  as  readily  as  one  trans- 
lates the  signs  of  the  alphabet  into  words.  But  the 
fighting  scenes  were  quite  realistic,  and  came  as  near 
murder  as  the  law  allowed,  to  the  vast  delight  of  the 
audience  to  whom  these  were  the  raison  d'etre  of  pic- 
tured history. 

But  for  every  one  who  looked  at  the  Tai  Ping  rebel- 
lion, there  were  a  hundred  who  crowded  into  some  great 
motion  picture  hall.  A  huge  enclosure  of  darkness, 
without  seats,  lit  with  gleams  of  light  from  the  picture 
at  the  far  end  of  the  room,  and  the  glitter  of  a  thousand 
eyes  in  the  shadows,  fixed  in  passionate  absorption,  an 
utter  oneness  of  gazing — that  theatre  represented  such 
a  concentration  of  humanity  as  I  have  never  seen,  a 
vision  of  human  beings  become  one  flesh,  of  bodies  that 
had  lost  all  boundaries,  joined  and  merged  in  one  odor- 
ous, steaming,  throbbing  mass.  And  yet  it  could  not  be 
offensive,  that  terrible  massing  of  crowds,  because  of 
the  beating  of  hearts  one  could  feel  in  that  darkness,  and 
the  flutter  of  stifled  souls. 

Yet  I  confess  that  it  was  with  a  sense  of  release  that 
I  emerged  again  beneath  the  cool  stars  amidst  the  lights 
of  a  great  amusement  garden.  Here  among  the  shrub- 
bery and  the  gravelled  walks,  a  ferris  wheel  was  climb- 
ing to  the  stars,  watched  by  hundreds  of  eyes  in  which 
fear  of  the  eerie  journey  fought  with  desire.  Every  time 


72  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

a  passenger  alighted  he  was  hailed  with  question  and 
congratulation,  like  one  returning  from  Mars,  and  as 
each  one  ventured  forth  and  upward,  he  received  a  send- 
off  like  one  who  goes  to  tilt  with  the  planets.  But  be- 
neath, in  the  glare  of  these  sophisticated  lights  of  the 
wheel,  a  tiger  slept  in  his  cage,  breathing  as  gently  as  a 
baby,  and  stirring  with  feeble  restlessness  in  his  dreams. 
And  in  the  softness  and  relaxation  of  the  great  brute 
there  was  the  pathos  that  belongs  to  all  sleeping  life, 
and  stirs  the  coldest  heart  to  deep,  obscure  impulses  of 
tenderness  and  affection;  and  here  and  there  some  Chi- 
nese turned  from  the  swinging  marvels  all  around  to 
gaze  through  the  bars  of  his  cage  with  gentle  and  sober 
eyes. 

But  such  incursions  into  others'  gaiety  only  whetted 
my  taste  for  something  that  lay  as  yet  undefined  in  my 
unconscious — for  a  taste  of  the  flesh-pots  of  society  per- 
haps, for  paths  of  experience  that  were  really  my 
own,  or  it  may  be  for  that  undiscovered  companionship, 
that  possible  guest  in  every  gathering,  that  unknown 
host  beyond  each  threshold  who  is  the  unacknowledged 
magnet  of  youth  when  it  goes  adventuring.  Practical 
plans  of  research  and  writing  were  now  in  my  mind, 
definite  as  a  map  or  a  guide  book ;  and  out  of  my  more 
nebulous  thoughts  Peking  emerged  as  a  dream  and  a 
goal.  There  was  the  vanquished  splendour  of  the  old 
empire,  and  the  focus  of  the  hopes  of  to-day — the  story 
of  the  past  and  the  vision  of  the  future,  writ  large  in 
stone  and  treasure.  To  Peking  I  would  go. 

While  the  practical  details  of  this  purpose  were  ma- 
turing, I  stopped  at  Cook's  office  one  afternoon  to  col- 
lect my  mail.  The  first  note  I  opened  was  in  Dorothy's 
large,  rapid,  and  fluent  handwriting. 

"My  dear,"  she  wrote,  "I  am  wild  to  see  you.    I  have 


AN  ALUMNA  REUNION  73 

wonderful  news  to  tell  you.  Oh,  no,  not  about  the 
Y.  M.  C.  A.  Nothing  doing,  there — it's  quite  passe!" 
etc.  .  .  .  She  proceeded  with  elaborate  instructions  for 
me  to  join  them  in  Korea  in  a  mouth  or  six  weeks ;  and 
ended  with  fervent  promises  to  tell  me  "all  about  it." 
What  it  was  I  had  not  gathered,  nor  did  I  ever  expect  to 
learn.  I  knew  that,  whatever  it  might  be,  six  weeks  of 
Dorothy's  swift  young  life  would  make  it  prehistoric. 

Yet  the  effect  of  this  breezy  transference  of  Dorothy's 
personality  to  paper  was  to  plunge  me  deeper  into  a 
morass  of  loneliness.  It  was  the  mood  in  which  desper- 
ate deeds  are  born.  An  enclosure  in  the  next  letter  pro- 
vided temptation  and  the  instrument  in  the  shape  of  a 
gold  draft.  Half  idly,  with  no  really  serious  purpose, 
except  that  of  hypnotizing  myself  with  hope,  I  said  to 
the  agent  in  Cook's  office : 

"Do  you  think  you  could  get  me  a  passage  to  India  by 
the  end  of  the  summer?" 

"I  doubt  it,"  he  answered. 

His  tone  annoyed  me.  I  began  to  argue  with  him. 
Another  clerk  entered  the  discussion.  And  the  end  was 
that  I  deposited  ten  pounds  on  a  ticket  to  India,  sagely 
reflecting  that  this  was  as  good  a  bank  as  any,  since  the 
money  could  be  refunded,  and  childishly  enjoying  the 
sight  of  a  rather  nebulous  dream  confirmed  in  black  and 
white  on  a  receipt  for  the  money.  Somewhat  cheered 
by  this  foolhardy  performance,  and  promising  myself 
to  put  in  an  application  for  the  extension  of  my  passport 
at  the  office  of  the  Consul-General  before  I  left  for 
Peking,  I  turned  down  the  Bund  in  a  rickshaw.  There 
have  been  many  acts  which  I  have  performed  with  more 
forethought  and  sobriety  of  purpose  than  that  applica- 
tion for  passage  to  India  but  few,  I  think,  so  fraught 
with  consequences. 


74  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

The  Bund  is  the  avenue  that  fronts  the  sea,  and  is 
the  fashionable  promenade  of  Shanghai.  Up  and  down 
it  surges  a  wondrous  pageant  of  humanity,  samples  of 
all  races  of  men,  Chinese,  Japanese,  Europeans,  Amer- 
icans, and  men  of  all  colours  and  degrees  from  the  Pa- 
cific isles.  Kickshaws  and  antique  coaches  rub  elbows 
with  shining  Kolls  Boyces  and  sometimes  make  way  for 
wagons  drawn  by  long  chains  of  coolies,  who  sing  with 
a  kind  of  rhythmical  grunting  as  they  move.  Beyond, 
in  the  harbour,  sway  the  masts  of  the  river  junks,  thick 
as  a  bamboo  forest. 

I  looked  forth  on  the  surging  crowds — at  the  gay  Eng- 
lish ladies  with  big  hats  and  parasols ;  at  the  Chinese  la- 
dies, hatless,  trousered,  rouged;  at  the  little  Chinese 
schoolgirls  with  long  bangs  in  their  eyes;  at  the  great 
turbaned  Sikhs  with  guns,  presiding  over  the  crossing  in 
lieu  of  traffic  cops.  To  be  alone  in  an  alien  metropolis 
often  induces  a  curious  detachment,  melancholy,  arid,  ac- 
quiescent— a  suspension  of  feeling  and  thought,  nay, 
even,  it  seems,  of  life  itself.  For  we  are  conscious  of  our 
own  life  mainly  through  its  reflection  in  others  like  our- 
selves, and  to  be  deprived  of  all  the  familiar  images 
which  express  your  life  to  yourself  is  to  be,  for  the  time, 
robbed  of  being.  And  one  who  has  known  long  loneliness 
in  a  strange  land  falls  into  a  kind  of  maze — a  state 
neither  of  joy  nor  sorrow  nor  even  of  hope  in  which 
everything  about  him  recedes  into  more  and  more  dis- 
tant perspective  of  unreality. 

Something  of  this  deathly  enchantment  had  fallen 
upon  me  that  afternoon.  It  seemed  only  a  picture 
through  which  I  rode;  they  were  not,  they  could  not  be 
real — these  thousands  of  strange  beings,  these  men  and 
these  women.  It  could  not  be  that  I  was  really  there,  in 
that  strange  city — I — I — who  was  I?  My  mind  clung 


AN  ALUMNAE  REUNION  75 

uneasily  to  this  question  that  has  no  answer,  as  a  swim- 
mer in  deep  water  may  cling  to  a  floating  bit  of  slippery 
wood. 

"Marjorie,"  cried  a  voice  that  called  me  back  into 
life  like  the  trump  of  the  resurrection.  "What  are  you 
doing  in  Shanghai?" 

I  could  only  search  the  face  before  me  feverishly,  anx- 
iously, as  if  this  were  one  of  the  hallucinations  of  the 
solitary,  and  murmur  her  name",  "Edna."  How  aston- 
ishing that  she  should  stand  there  in  the  flesh,  her  very 
self,  rosy,  freckled,  a  little  matronly,  her  breezy,  red 
hair  blown  in  tendrils  about  her  candid  sweet  face. 
For  we  had  been  classmates  in  college.  In  the  soft  twi- 
light of  our  Commencement  Day,  amidst  the  wrecks  of 
pennants,  tea-sets,  and  sofa-cushions,  we  had  vowed 
eternal  fealty,  and  a  monthly  exchange  of  letters.  The 
letters  had  never  come,  nor  any  news.  Now  the  years 
fell  suddenly  away,  and  here,  amidst  the  press  and  crush 
of  this  Oriental  throng,  we  stood  face  to  face,  friends 
and  chums,  as  if  it  were  all  but  yesterday. 

Dismissing  our  rickshaws  with  a  lavish  fee  for  the 
whole  afternoon,  we  hailed  a  double-seated  carriage  in 
which  we  could  sit  side  by  side  and  pour  out  the  auto- 
biographical details  which  had  brought  us  to  this  meet- 
ing in  Shanghai.  She  was  married.  I  smiled  at  the 
news,  as  one  receiving  congratulations  on  her  own 
handiwork.  I  had  sacrificed  a  good  many  hours  of  my 
young  beauty  sleep  settling  Edna's  matrimonial  future 
in  midnight  confidences. 

"Is  it  Harry?"  I  asked  complacently,  prepared  to  re- 
ceive the  just  rewards  of  my  labours. 

"Harry?"  She  puzzled  over  the  name,  remembered  it 
at  last,  and  laughed,  "I  had  quite  forgotten." 

Crestfallen,  I  listened  and  learned  the  limits  of  con- 


76  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

fidence  in  friendship,  even  in  college.  All  the  while  I 
was  expending  my  best  efforts  on  Harry,  there  was  an- 
other, a  shy  young  instructor  in  Economics.  I  remem- 
bered him? 

"Yes,  but  I  never  supposed— 

"Of  course  not,"  said  Edna,  laughing.  But  she  had 
the  grace  to  explain.  He  was  an  instructor.  It  being 
bad  form  for  instructors  to  flirt  with  students,  she  had 
kept  all  the  preliminaries  a  secret  lest  they  should 
somehow  get  about  and  jeopardize  his  position.  "You 
know  how  it  was.  Marriage  was  all  right  in  a  serious 
young  professor  who  mysteriously  appeared  after  sum- 
mer vacation  with  a  bride.  But  courtship  that  any  one 
knew  about  was  taboo." 

A  simple  little  academic  romance  and  destined,  it 
seemed,  to  blossom  in  the  safe  prosaic  fields  of  home! 
But  one  day  Robert  had  got  a  chance  to  go  out  to  an 
American  college  in  India  on  a  three  year  contract. 
Everybody  warned  them.  "Edna,"  said  her  old  Sunday 
school  teacher,  "it's  an  awful  heathen  land  where 
widows  burn  themselves  and  people  all  suffer  from  caste 
and  other  dreadful  diseases."  But  they  were  fired  with 
the  adventure  of  it,  and  put  all  their  small  savings  into 
the  preparations.  All  went  well  till  they  got  to  Shang- 
hai. By  that  time  the  war  had  begun.  The  British 
government  was  getting  anxious  about  India  and  its 
loyalty.  Every  one  who  entered  India  from  any  foreign 
country  to  teach  or  to  preach  must  be  carefully  exam- 
ined for  unorthodox  doctrines.  So  Robert  and  Edna 
were  both  detained  in  Shanghai  for  three  months  while 
the  British  government  probed  into  Robert's  intellectual 
past.  All  the  while  their  money  dwindled,  and  the  day 
of  the  birth  of  Edna's  baby  drew  near.  At  the  end  of 
that  time  they  were  refused  admission  to  India.  Some 


AN  ALUMNAE  REUNION  77 

hints  of  pacificism  and  the  self-determination  of  peo- 
ples had  been  found  in  Robert's  contributions  to  Politi- 
cal Science  quarterlies.  The  money  was  almost  gone. 
They  moved  from  poor  lodgings  to  poorer  ones.  The 
baby  was  born  in  a  mission  hospital.  There  was  not  even 
money  left  for  doctor's  bills,  and  none  for  passage  home. 

But  the  missionaries  came  to  the  rescue.  Robert  got 
an  opportunity  to  teach  biology  in  the  Baptist  College. 
"It  is  all  right  now,"  concluded  Edna,  between  a  smile 
and  a  sigh.  "But  I  don't  know  whether  we  will  ever 
see  home  again  or  not." 

Meanwhile  I  must  come  out  to-morrow  and  spend  the 
day  and  myself  witness  the  conclusion  of  her  romance. 
With  that  promise  we  parted.  Loneliness  was  banished. 
I  went  to  sleep  that  night  in  a  private  jubilee  of  memory 
and  expectation. 

Next  day  I  found  the  Baptist  college  in  the  suburbs 
of  Shanghai,  a  group  of  gaunt  red  buildings  set  in  the 
midst  of  green  grass  and  sunshine,  beside  the  pale  floods 
of  a  muddy  river.  As  I  drew  near  to  the  little  bunga- 
lows which  clustered  in  the  shade  of  the  larger  build- 
ings, I  saw  men  in  khaki,  with  guns  on  their  shoulders, 
running  from  all  directions.  Edna  came  down  the 
gravel  walk  to  meet  me,  and  kissed  me  warmly. 

"I  never  expected  to  see  you  to-day,"  she  said. 

Then  she  explained.  There  was  excitement  in  Shang- 
hai which  I  had  missed.  Coolies  who  were  suffering 
from  not  ill-founded  grievances  were  rioting,  attacking 
the  street-cars  and  the  buildings  in  the  foreign  settle- 
ment. The  volunteers  were  all  called  out.  Though  the 
more  liberal-minded  of  them  sympathized  with  the  Chi- 
nese in  the  quarrel,  as  white  men  they  must  stand  to- 
gether for  self-defence.  The  claims  of  justice  must 
wait  on  peace. 


78 

"Which,"  said  Robert,  in  his  capacity  of  economist, 
"is  really  a  fallacy,  and  one  which  is  responsible  for  a 
good  many  wrongs  in  the  Orient." 

Yet,  despite  these  opinions,  he,  too,  was  in  khaki. 

"Just  the  same,"  said  Edna,  kissing  her  warrior  good- 
bye, as  the  street  car  appeared  to  bear  the  army  to  the 
scene  of  action,  "when  you  are  ordered  to  kill  a  Chinese, 
just  aim  at  the  telegraph  pole." 

As  for  the  rest  of  that  sweet  day — I  do  not  know  how 
to  bring  to  the  reader  who  has  not  known  the  ante- 
cedent mood  the  beauty  of  its  small  details  or  the  poetry 
of  its  commonplaceness. 

Edna's  home  was  of  a  type  that  abounds  in  the  inex- 
pensive suburbs  of  America — a  cheerful,  cleanly  little 
bungalow,  with  a  screened  and  vine-covered  veranda, 
a  lawn  and  a  gravelled  walk,  and,  behind  it,  a  little 
vegetable  garden.  All  morning  we  puttered  around  on 
small  domestic  tasks.  These  were  necessarily  limited 
in  scope  and  direction,  for  a  Chinese  "boy"  presided  in 
the  primitive  Chinese  kitchen  at  the  back  of  the  house, 
and,  humble  as  Edna's  purse  was,  as  a  white  woman  in 
China  she  belonged  to  the  caste  that  is  set  apart  from 
manual  toil  in  feudal  sanctity.  In  lands  where  servants 
are  not  yet  anachronisms,  they  cling  to  their  prerogatives 
as  tenaciously  as  lords.  Edna's  dignity  might  have  sur- 
vived the  cooking  of  her  own  dinner,  but  the  cook's 
never  would.  But  we  were  permitted  to  gather  string 
beans  in  Edna's  own  vegetable  garden,  where  she  had 
planted  seeds  imported  from  America,  and  where  no 
Chinese  gardener  might  enter  to  contaminate  the  earth. 
It  was  bordered  with  nasturtium  flowers,  that  gleamed 
like  gay  embroidery  against  a  clump  of  bamboos,  and 
flavoured  the  sunshine  with  their  spicy  breath.  After- 
wards, clothed  each  in  a  gingham  apron  that  had  ac- 


AN  ALUMNA  REUNION  79 

quired  an  exotic  glory  in  my  eyes,  we  prepared  the 
beans,  sitting  in  housewifely  fashion  on  the  screened 
veranda  with  tin  pans  imported  from  Wanamaker's,  by 
mail  order,  in  our  laps.  Outside,  the  wide  fertile  fields 
lay  still  and  rich  in  the  sunshine,  and  the  creatures  that 
sing  among  the  summer  grass  buzzed  with  a  thousand 
voices.  The  ways  of  the  good  earth  never  change.  She 
but  alters  her  dress  from  land  to  land,  but  never  her 
voice  and  the  light  in  her  eyes.  We  might  have  been 
two  housewives  on  a  farm-house  porch  in  Ohio.  The 
vistas  of  green  and  the  hum  of  the  summer  morning 
would  have  been  the  same — and  the  tin  pans  and  the 
beans.  And  in  that  perception  I  found  both  mystery 
and  comfort.  So  we  gardened  and  chattered  and  fed, 
in  maternal  partnership,  her  spluttering,  crowing,  red- 
haired  baby.  And  beyond  this,  that  happy  day,  like  the 
days  of  a  happy  nation,  has  no  history. 

And  yet  there  was  history  after  all,  and  in  the  me- 
morial peace  of  this  narrative,  I  have  almost  forgotten 
it.  For  as  the  somnolence  of  noon-tide  wakened  to  the 
touch  of  a  little  breeze  that  came  rippling  to  us  over 
bending  blades  of  rice,  Edna  suggested  a  walk  among 
the  villages.  So  it  happened  that  we  discovered  the 
little  creature  whom  we  named  Cinderella  of  the  bam- 
boos. 


CINDERELLA  OF  THE  BAMBOOS 

SHE  lived  in  a  little  house  of  woven  bamboo,  amid  the 
sunny  shimmer  of  bamboo  leaves.  The  bamboo  was  one 
of  many  clumps  in  the  midst  of  a  lush,  waterfed  coun- 
tryside which  looked  like  a  Dutch  landscape,  rolling 
away  to  meet  billowing  clouds  on  the  low  horizon,  and 
lighted  by  the  calm  light  of  pools  and  rivers  and  canals 
without  currents  or  waves.  It  seemed  a  dainty  place, 
that  clump  of  bamboos.  As  we  drew  near  along  a  wind- 
ing path  through  the  rice-fields,  the  bamboo  swarmed 
with  life.  Out  of  it  poured  streams  of  brown,  beady- 
eyed  people  with  uncombed  pigtails,  vociferating,  threat- 
ening, like  a  hive  of  wild  bees  disturbed  in  the  forest. 
They  seemed  strangely  like  animals,  and  despite  Edna's 
limited  Chinese,  we  were  inadequate  to  the  social  situa- 
tion. 

Then  up  rose  the  headman  of  the  village,  for  these 
lairs  among  the  bamboos  formed  a  village,  and  no  doubt 
a  very  old  village,  with  a  history  stretching  back  through 
ages  of  unrecorded  time.  The  headman  of  the  village 
said  to  the  croaking  multitude:  "Are  you  dogs?  Are 
you  beasts?  Do  you  not  know  what  these  queer  things 
are?  They  are  foreign  devils.  They  are  kings  of  China 
now,  and  must  be  treated  with  respect." 

The  people  slunk  away.  But  thereafter  the  bamboos 
seemed  to  grow  eyes,  and  we  were  haunted  by  beady  orbs 
of  beings  invisible.  We  followed  the  headman  as  he 
bowed  us  down  a  muddy  trail  into  a  little  house  woven 

80 


CINDEKELLA  OF  THE  BAMBOOS  81 

like  a  basket.  Would  we  come  in?  Within,  there  was 
a  screaming  and  cackling,  and  out  toddled  a  drove  of 
women  and  children.  This  was  the  headman's  family, 
the  wives  of  his  sons  and  his  sons'  sons,  and  all  the 
adopted  children  that  he  could  afford  to  include  among 
the  worshippers  at  the  altar  of  the  ancestors.  They  all 
lived  together  in  the  primitive  shack  without  windows, 
and  the  little  children  played  on  the  damp  dirt  floor  with 
the  animals.  Beaming,  they  invited  us  in  to  inspect 
their  dwelling.  They  even  produced  from  the  smoky, 
dusty  debris  within  one  foreign  chair  with  three  legs, 
which  they  dusted  and  set  down  for  us  with  a  flourish. 

Then  they  proceeded  to  introduce  the  family.  Here 
I  at  once  became  conscious  of  a  peculiarity  of  the  Chi- 
nese social  order  even  in  a  form  as  primitive  as  this. 
Within  the  family  there  is  a  distinct  difference  in  social 
status.  The  old  grandmother  was  mistress  of  cere- 
monies. She  was  a  neat  old  woman  in  tiny  red  shoes. 
Her  claim  to  social  supremacy  I  understood.  Beyond 
that,  I  was  helpless.  I  smiled  upon  a  pretty  young  thing 
standing  modestly  by.  There  was  a  stir  of  embarrass- 
ment in  the  group.  Evidently  I  had  made  a  faux  pas. 
Ah,  she  was  the  wife  of  a  younger  son  and  had  no  chil- 
dren. I  tried  again,  or  began  to  try;  for  suddenly  my 
eyes  fell  on  a  little  bundle  of  rags  in  the  corner,  out  of 
which  peered  the  oddest,  wildest,  most  suffering  grey- 
brown  eyes  I  had  ever  seen.  They  seemed  to  belong  to 
some  unidentified  species  of  animal. 

"What  a  nice  little  girl !"  I  exclaimed.  This  was  a  fib. 
It  was  not  a  nice  little  girl  at  all,  but  I  wanted  to  see 
what  it  was. 

Forthwith  there  was  a  flurry.  Another  faux  pas,  and 
decidedly  worse  than  the  other !  I  was  evidently  hope- 
less. The  grandmother  sprang  to  the  rescue  and  pro- 


82  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

duced  the  person  I  should  notice — a  plump,  complacent 
young  woman  swaying  on  her  bound  feet,  under  the 
weight  of  a  vast,  bulbous  babe.  She  set  the  baby  down 
on  its  unsteady  elephantine  legs,  and  the  whole  family 
beamed,  and  looked  to  me  for  congratulations.  She  was 
the  wife  of  the  eldest  grandson,  and  she  had  produced 
that.  Was  that  not  cause  for  congratulation? 

My  eyes  wandered  back  to  those  suffering  sparks  of 
light  in  the  corner  where  Cinderella  crouched  in  rags. 
"May  I  take  her  picture?"  I  asked.  Another  faux  pas— 
a  fatal  one !  The  family  buzzed.  I  should  have  asked 
for  the  picture  of  the  bulbous  babe.  It  was  out  of  the 
question  to  take  Cinderella's  picture.  She  was  only  a 
little  slave-girl  bought  for  one  of  the  younger  sons.  I 
protested;  I  entreated;  I  made  up  a  thousand  reasons 
why  I  should  have  Cinderella's  picture. 

The  others  merely  turned  to  her,  taunting  her.  What 
was  she  doing,  crawling  around  to  get  some  notice 
from  foreign  devils!  Meanwhile  the  old  grandmother, 
with  decision,  stood  the  bulbous  babe  up  on  his  shaky 
legs  against  his  complacent  mother  and  indicated  that 
there  was  a  subject  worthy  of  my  lens. 

Thinking  to  get  Cinderella  later  when  no  one  was 
looking,  I  at  last  yielded  and  wasted  two  films  on  that 
little  lump  of  yellow  flesh,  blinking  at  me  with  blank 
eyes.  When  I  turned,  Cinderella  was  gone,  and  all  the 
Chinese  in  Edna's  possession  would  not  elicit  a  remark 
concerning  her,  nor  even  an  admission  that  she  existed 
and  that  we  had  seen  her. 

Yet,  as  we  were  picking  our  way  out  through  the  ill- 
smelling  de"bris  which  surrounded  the  house,  we  came, 
amidst  a  clump  of  bamboos,  upon  a  stone  coffin,  in  the 
cracks  of  which  flowers  like  dandelions  were  growing. 
For  a  minute  I  had  an  odd  feeling  that  the  suffering 


The  mother  of  the   bulbous   babe   indicated   that   there   was   a 
subject  worthy  of  my  camera 


•''       '*•''•     •' 

_.\-     :•''". 


'. 

She  seemed  to  remember  that  life  was  not  always  like  this 


Patrician   girls  learned  English   and   foreign  manners   through 
the  medium  of  Shakespeare 


The  slum  children   looked   upon   the    fair   mandarin   daughters 
with  unconscious  cynicism 


CINDERELLA  OF  THE  BAMBOOS  83 

grey  eyes  of  Cinderella  were  looking  at  me  from  that 
coffin.  Then  there  was  a  rustle  among  the  bamboos  and 
some  one  was  gone.  Edna  seemed  to  notice  nothing,  but 
as  we  walked  home  in  the  rosy  light  of  the  low  sun,  she 
remarked,  "Do  you  know  what  I  think  about  her?" 

"What?" 

"She  has  white  blood." 

As  we  turned  into  the  college  grounds,  with  the  mel- 
ancholy of  this  encounter  still  upon  us,  a  pretty  little 
figure  came  skipping  down  the  path,  and  flung  herself 
ardently  into  Edna's  arms.  She  was  the  quaintest  little 
girl  that  ever  my  eyes  beheld.  Her  silhouette  was  that 
of  a  smart  little  American  miss,  with  frilly,  starched 
skirts,  and  bobbed  hair  tied  with  a  big  pink  bow.  But 
her  skin  and  her  features  were  Chinese.  Introduced  as 
"our  Leila,"  she  began  chattering  about  her  kittens,  her 
"mother,"  and  "the  Chinese."  Of  these  last  she  spoke 
with  that  air  of  superiority  which  little  white  children, 
despite  all  teaching  to  the  contrary,  so  quickly  adopt  in 
the  Orient,  and  which  is  fostered  by  the  Oriental  serv- 
ants themselves. 

Afterwards  Edna  explained  that  she  had  been  left  as 
a  tiny  baby — so  tiny  that  her  squinting  eyes  were  still 
blue,  not  black,  and  her  skin  had  not  yet  grown  yellow- 
on  the  doorstep  of  one  of  the  American  teachers.  Mrs. 
Brown  had  taken  her  in  out  of  kindness,  intending  to 
turn  her  over  to  a  missionary  orphanage  so  soon  as  the 
arrangements  could  be  made.  But  she  had  so  quickly 
developed  into  a  bright  and  winning  baby,  and  had  so 
effectively  entwined  herself  around  the  hearts  of  a  child- 
less household,  that,  by  the  time  the  slant-eyed  little 
creature  was  six  months  old,  Mrs.  Brown  could  not  be 
separated  from  her.  And  when  the  first  words  that  she 
uttered  were  "Daddy,"  and  "Mamma,"  with  an  Ameri- 


84  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

can  intonation,  she  had  been  adopted  as  a  little  daughter. 
It  had  delighted  the  whole  community  to  see  the  little 
thing  with  her  alien  looks  taking  on  all  the  ways  of  her 
American  guardians.  Never  had  a  child  been  more 
tenderly  reared,  more  exquisitely  dressed.  She  was  now 
seven  years  old,  a  clever,  demonstrative,  loving  little 
creature,  full  of  pranks  and  winning  ways.  Though  she 
was  beginning  to  dislike  the  fact  that  her  hair  was  so 
black,  and  her  eyes  not  large  and  blue  like  those  of  her 
"parents,"  she  did  not  yet  know  that  she  was  really 
Chinese  and  not  American. 

She  skipped  all  the  way  home  with  us,  chattering  like 
a  little  sparrow.  Then,  seeing  in  the  distance  some  one 
else  whom  she  knew,  she  ran  away  to  throw  herself  into 
another  pair  of  welcoming  arms. 

"Isn't  she  darling?"  said  Edna. 

I  admitted  that  she  was,  but  I  looked  upon  her  with 
pity  and  questioning.  What  was  to  happen  when  she 
carried  those  pretty  ways  beyond  the  safety  of  seven 
years  into  the  dangerous  contacts  of  seventeen?  Some 
day  some  one's  arms  would  want  to  welcome  a  creature 
so  graceful  and  loving  to  more  than  paternal  guardian- 
ship, and  then  what  cross  currents  of  race  and  environ- 
ment would  enter  in,  what  shadows  of  unknown  an- 
cestors and  potential  creatures  to  be  would  arise  like 
unlaid  ghosts.  Then  I  thought  of  that  poor  little 
troubled  thing  in  the  hut  among  the  bamboos,  hiding 
amidst  the  de"bris  of  that  place  to  escape  a  blow  and  a 
taunt,  looking  out  with  tortured  grey  eyes  that  seemed 
vaguely  to  hold  a  memory  of  something  that  was  not  like 
this.  She  might  have  been  such  a  little  girl  as  Leila,  so 
happy  and  so  winsome. 

I  looked  at  Edna,  at  her  fresh  rosy  colouring  of  pure 
Nordic  type  and  serene  courageous  face.  She  had 


CINDEKELLA  OP  THE  BAMBOOS  85 

spoken  of  hard  times.  But  what  did  we  know  of  trag- 
edy— she  and  I?  Were  we  not  among  the  blessed— 
we  who  need  not  abandon  hope  at  the  very  threshold  of 
birth,  nor  carry  our  sorrow  through  life  in  our  blood 
and  the  fibres  of  our  flesh? 

When  I  reached  Edna's  cottage,  there  was  a  telephone 
message  to  the  effect  that  all  was  now  quiet  in  Shanghai, 
and  I  might  venture  back.  Again,  in  the  twilight,  we 
clasped  hands  and  said  good-bye.  We  did  not  promise 
undying  fealty  nor  correspondence  without  limits.  But 
I  carried  away  a  heart  warm  with  the  renewal  of  old 
memories,  and  as  I  sped  through  the  freshening  dusk 
to  the  far  lights  of  Shanghai,  the  chorus  of  the  frogs  in 
the  rice-pools  lifted  up  their  voices  in  the  strain  that 
knows  neither  location  nor  time.  Just  so  had  they 
chanted  at  evening  on  the  marshy  borders  of  our  college 
lake — an  accompaniment  to  romances  that  seemed  time- 
less then  and  were  forgotten  now — and  perhaps  Adam 
had  known  their  song  when  he  walked  with  Eve  in  the 
garden.  But  as  night  wrapped  around  me  the  sweet 
familiarity  of  darkness,  other  faces  were  painted  upon 
the  canvas  of  that  day  of  college  memories,  alien  and 
haunting — the  grey  eyes  of  Cinderella,  the  bobbed  hair 
of  dainty  Leila — heroines  of  half -told  tales,  fractions  of 
lives  whose  end  I  may  never  know. 


CHAPTER  XI 

OUTLAW  BRIDES 

WHEN  I  returned  to  my  room,  I  found  two  notes  await- 
ing me.  One  was  a  belated  addition  to  the  mail  from  the 
states,  telling  me  to  beware  how  I  walked  abroad  in 
Shanghai,  for  it  was  a  "most  immoral  city."  The  other 
was  a  note  from  one  Mr.  Sun  and  his  wife,  friends  of 
the  Bishop,  who  announced  that  they  would  come  at 
seven  o'clock  to  take  me  out  to  dinner.  Here  was  a 
chance  to  take  the  warning  seriously.  But  I  did  not, 
and  I  hasten  to  add  that  this  is  not  a  wily  introduc- 
tion, after  the  manner  of  the  short-story  writers,  to  a 
tale  of  exotic  murder. 

Promptly  at  seven  Mr.  Sun  and  his  wife  arrived  in  a 
dilapidated  little  carriage  drawn  by  an  elderly  horse. 
Mr.  Sun  was  a  kind  and  portly  Chinese  in  a  frock  coat. 
Mrs.  Sun  was  a  thin,  eager  little  body,  awkwardly  west- 
ernized by  a  high-necked  white  blouse,  a  tailored  black 
skirt,  and  a  frizzed  pompadour.  In  excellent,  though 
unadventurous  English,  they  welcomed  me  to  a  share 
in  the  carriage  and  we  drove  off. 

A  few  minutes  later  I  stood  upon  the  threshold  of  a 
fashionable  Chinese  inn. 

"Welcome  to  our  outlaw  band,"  cried  a  warm,  cordial 
voice,  and  a  comely  white  woman,  with  red-gold  hair 
wound  in  braids  around  her  head,  clasped  my  hand  with 
a  sincerity  and  warmth  which  belied  her  theatrical 
manner. 

"You  look  harmless,"   I  ventured,  smiling  at  what 

86 


OUTLAW  BRIDES  87 

was  apparently  the  company  of  outlaws.  A  group  of 
studious  young  Chinese  were  standing  in  a  circle  around 
a  table  covered  with  an  Occidental  white  table  cloth, 
and  decorated  with  a  large  centrepiece  of  glass  fruit. 
Besides  our  apparent  hostess  and  Mrs.  Sun,  I  was  evi- 
dently to  enjoy  no  feminine  company. 

"Oh,"  said  the  red-haired  queen  of  the  outlaws,  in 
answer  to  my  remark,  "we  are  harmless — in  fact  a  rather 
unusually  virtuous  lot.  It's  just  that  I  used  to  be  a 
missionary  and  am  now  excommunicated  for  heresy  and 
an  undue  interest  in  the  Chinese  revolution,  and  these 
young  men  used  to  be  proper  sons  of  their  fathers,  and 
now  they  are  anathema  in  their  households  and  their 
cities,  and  are  living  in  Shanghai,  where,  under  British 
protection,  they  may  safely  plot  the  overthrow  of  the 
ancestors." 

"Miss  Burton  is  vivacious,"  said  the  suave  voice  of 
a  Chinese  next  to  me,  "but  it  is  true  that  we  are  all 
interested  in  the  progress  of  China." 

So  was  I,  but  I  found  it  difficult  to  make  the  matter 
known.  Thoughts  grew  cold  and  lost  their  savour,  and 
feelings  evaporated  and  left  only  the  dregs  of  ennui, 
before  we  could  translate  them  into  the  fraction  of 
language  we  held  in  common.  Though  no  doubt  our 
feelings  were  more  akin  than  our  alphabets,  upon  our 
converse  lay  the  curse  of  Babel. 

Still,  the  courses  of  the  dinner  slipped  by,  twenty- 
four  of  them  in  number,  and  all  to  be  consumed 
with  chop  sticks.  The  food  was  of  the  same  general 
type  as  that  which  we  know  as  chop  suey, — more  like 
an  endless  succession  of  savoury  hashes  and  stews  and 
entries  than  the  ponderous  but  highly  differentiated 
courses  of  our  meals.  The  pidce  de  resistance  was 
sharks'  fins,  a  tasteless,  gelatinous  delicacy,  and  toward 


88  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  end  there  came  an  almond-flavoured  concoction  of 
appalling  sweetness. 

"I  don't  know  why  you  should  give  any  further  ex- 
hibition of  gastronomical  courage,"  remarked  Miss  Bur- 
ton, suddenly.  "It  is  now  eleven  o'clock,  and  I  think 
I'll  take  you  home  to  spend  the  night  with  me." 

I  demurred.  I  spoke  of  my  lack  of  preparation  for 
such  an  event,  and  the  unsuitability  of  my  garb  to  the 
morning  light  in  which  I  should  have  to  return.  But  she 
overbore  my  reluctance,  laughing.  Seizing  my  hand  as 
she  did  so,  she  patted  and  pressed  it  with  so  warm  and 
vital  a  touch  that  it  magnetized  me  into  submission. 
Then  she  proceeded,  with  lordly  disregard  of  my  pro- 
tests, to  order  the  carriage. 

"This  little  girl  comes,  too,"  she  said,  suddenly  draw- 
ing Mrs.  Sun  to  her — who  stood  back  looking  a  little 
shy  and  jealous,  I  thought,  and  Mrs.  Sun,  thus  restored 
to  grace,  cuddled  into  the  circle  of  the  large,  gracious 
white  arm  around  her  waist  like  a  contented  kitten. 

So,  before  I  had  rightly  collected  my  thoughts,  the 
radical  conclave  of  young  men  had  bowed  itself  off, 
Mr.  Sun  had  deposited  us  in  a  carriage  with  some 
nourish  of  Occidental  chivalry,  and  we  were  riding  out 
Bubbling  Well  Road  beneath  the  skies  of  midnight. 

Turning  off  into  a  dirt  lane  that  ran  through  lonely 
meadows,  now  lying  wide  and  silvery  beneath  the  star- 
light and  the  dew,  we  stopped  before  a  high  garden  wall. 
In  answer  to  the  coachman's  knock  the  gate  was  opened 
about  a  quarter  of  an  inch,  and  then  thrown  wide  with 
a  delighted  cry  of  recognition,  by  a  little  old  Chinese 
watchman  who  carried  a  kerosene  lantern. 

We  followed  him  up  a  gravel  path,  between  the  dark, 
heavy,  perfumed  heads  of  blossoming  roses,  to  the 
screened  veranda.  Here  a  Chinese  girl  emerged  and 


OUTLAW  BRIDES  SO 

flung  herself  on  Miss  Burton's  neck,  while  two  or  three 
others,  seeing  me,  stood  with  more  constraint  and 
dignity  in  the  doorway. 

"You  silly  things,"  said  Miss  Burton,  kissing  each 
one  of  them,  "why  are  you  up  at  this  hour?" 

"Because  we  thought  you  might  bring  a  nice  guest," 
answered  a  slim,  waxen-faced  little  thing,  with  lumi- 
nous eyes,  as  she  shook  hands  with  me  with  Occidental 
ease. 

But  a  tall  flat-faced  young  woman  with  tortoise-shell 
glasses  and  a  slower  wit  had  already  begun  to  confess 
that  they  had  got  into  a  dispute  about  the  meaning  of  a 
passage  of  Tolstoi  which  they  were  reading,  and  had  not 
noticed  the  hour.  The  third,  a  placid  motherly  girl,  had 
already  gone  in  search  of  some  mango  ice-cream  to  re- 
enforce  what  she  surmised  to  be  my  meagre  indulgence 
in  Chinese  dainties. 

Forthwith  I  was  ushered  into  a  most  gracious  room— 
a  long  low-ceilinged  library,  lined  with  book-cases, 
and  furnished  with  blue  Chinese  rugs,  a  davenport,  a 
mahogany  desk,  a  steamer  chair  piled  with  cushions  of 
Chinese  silk  and  embroidery,  some  lacquer  tables,  and 
coloured  reproductions  of  Fra  Angelico  in  narrow  gold 
frames.  From  every  corner  the  gentle  angels  of  the  old 
saint  blew  their  trumpets,  and  over  the  desk  all  Para- 
dise was  disporting  itself  upon  large  and  starry  flowers, 
at  the  feet  of  the  pensive  queen  of  Heaven. 

Mrs.  Sun  and  the  other  girls  had  now  gathered  in 
a  circle  around  us,  sitting  on  cushions  on  the  floor,  Mrs. 
Sun  with  her  head  in  Miss  Burton's  lap.  Despite  the 
apparent  dislike  of  the  Chinese  for  our  demonstrative 
ways,  Miss  Burton  petted  all  the  girls  continually,  and 
her  warm  electric  touch  and  sweet  smile  seemed  to  work 
a  charm  upon  them,  breaking  down  the  Oriental  stiff- 


90 

ness  that  stands  between  the  westerner  and  these  east- 
ern souls.  While  we  ate  the  mango  ice-cream,  with  al- 
mond cakes,  she  told  me  what  they  were  all  doing  here 
in  her  pretty  home. 

It  seems  that  they  were  girls  who  had  been  ostracized 
from  their  homes  because  of  their  adoption  of  foreign 
ways,  and  especially  because  of  unpopular  marriages. 
Mrs.  Sun,  "Topsy"  (the  little  clever  one,  who  knew 
how  to  shake  hands),  and  "Tistie,"  who  was  concerned 
to  understand  Tolstoi,  had  all  been  indemnity  students 
in  the  United  States.  Pearl,  who  looked  so  capable  and 
motherly,  had  studied  in  a  mission  school  in  China, 
and  was  a  trained  nurse.  "Tistie"  had  a  master's  de- 
gree from  an  American  university. 

Topsy's  career  of  revolt  had  been  blithe  and  decisive. 
Though  in  her  town  the  anti-foot-binding  movement  had 
not  yet  reached  the  ranks  of  good  society,  her  father 
had  been  a  progressive  and  liberal  man,  with  consider- 
able contact  with  foreigners,  and  had  always  been  op- 
posed to  deforming  the  feet.  So  her  feet  were  not 
touched  till  she  was  fourteen.  Then  her  father  died, 
and  her  eldest  brother  succeeded  as  head  of  the  house. 
He  was  conventional  in  the  extreme,  and  took  the  re- 
sponsibility of  getting  her  a  husband  seriously.  In  the 
performance  of  this  duty  he  felt  himself  sadly  checked 
by  her  unfashionable  feet.  So  it  was  decided  that,  diffi- 
cult and  painful  as  the  hideous  process  was  at  her  age, 
and  hopeless  as  it  was  to  think  of  getting  her  feet  down 
to  really  elegant  proportions,  the  torture  must  begin — 
an  opinion  in  which  her  poor,  tottering,  twisted-backed 
mother  entirely  concurred.  Whereupon  Topsy  picked 
herself  up  on  her  two  serviceable  feet  and  ran  away. 
The  freedom  which  her  father  had  allowed  her,  together 
with  a  gay  and  resolute  temper,  served  her  in  a  perform- 


OUTLAW  BRIDES  1)1 

ance  in  which  ninety-nine  per  cent  of  Chinese  girls  would 
come  to  grief.  Somehow,  by  some  process  of  wit  and 
witchery,  she  got  to  a  mission  school,  and  demonstrated 
her  intention  to  stay  there.  The  American  mission- 
aries would  not  have  dared  to  hold  her  against  the  will 
of  her  family,  but  a  Chinese  teacher,  one  of  those  de- 
termined characters  which  the  first  years  of  a  feminist 
revolt  always  breeds,  adopted  her  and  furnished  funds 
for  her  schooling.  She  won  an  indemnity  scholarship 
and  went  to  college  in  America,  where,  during  her  senior 
year,  she  married  a  classmate,  a  brilliant  young  Chinese 
already  known  for  his  writings.  They  set  up  housekeep- 
ing in  an  apartment  in  the  upper  Bronx,  and  she  en- 
joyed one  glorious  year,  shopping  in  American  style, 
going  nightly  to  the  theatre  or  to  Greenwich  Village 
parties,  and  collaborating  with  her  husband  in  his 
studies  and  writings.  His  interests  had  temporarily 
brought  them  back  to  Shanghai.  But  they  were  in- 
tending to  return  to  America  shortly.  She  was  merely 
visiting  Miss  Burton  while  her  husband  was  in  Peking. 
She  told  her  story  gaily,  with  no  inhibitions  and  no 
regrets.  She  was  one  of  those  souls  for  whom  revolt 
carries  with  it  no  agony  of  detachment,  no  prickings 
of  conscience,  nor  homesickness  for  old  ways.  To  her 
family  she  was  as  one  dead.  They  held  her  funeral, 
when  she  absolutely  refused  to  come  back,  and  an  oblig- 
ing friend  had  said  that  her  mother  often  wept  for  her. 

"It  is  her  punishment,"  said  Topsy  coolly.  "She  was 
too  stupid!  Not  till  she  saw  me  crippled,  humiliated, 
and  bored  to  death  in  the  house  of  a  mother-in-law  would 
her  love  be  satisfied.  I  have  chosen  a  love  for  my  life, 
and  it  is  not  like  that." 

One  could  see  that  her  words  were  salt  in  the  wounds 
of  the  other  girls,  to  whom  rebellion  came  less  easily. 


92  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

They  were  less  ready  with  their  stories,  and  what  I  tell 
I  merely  surmised  and  pieced  together.  Mrs.  Sun's 
tale  was  a  simple  one.  She  and  her  husband  were  not 
absolutely  ostracized.  Originally  betrothed  by  their 
parents,  they  had  mutually  assisted  each  other,  in 
devious  and  underground  ways,  to  get  a  foreign  educa- 
tion, and  between  them  there  was  apparently  a  loyal 
affection,  deep-rooted  in  childhood,  though  her  grand 
passion  for  Miss  Burton  revealed  something  in  her  that, 
I  think,  her  husband  had  not  found.  They  had  chosen 
to  live  in  Shanghai,  in  semi-foreign  style,  and  edited  a 
little  radical  paper  between  them.  His  parents  would 
take  them  back,  provided  they  would  conform  to  the 
ways  of  the  patriarchal  household.  But  she  was  not 
minded  to  make  one  of  a  half-dozen  daughters-in-law 
under  the  rule  of  an  old  woman  who  had  never  been 
outside  of  her  own  garden.  Nor  was  he  interested  in 
inheriting  as  a  good  son,  and  one  of  many  brothers, 
what  he  felt  to  be  the  stupid  machinery  and  senseless 
responsibilities  of  provincial  Chinese  life  of  the  old  style. 
Between  them  and  the  parents  there  existed  that  ten- 
tative and  irritating  intercourse  which,  in  such  cases, 
is  worse  than  actual  separation,  each  side  trying  to 
compromise,  each  trying  to  proselytize  the  other,  each 
trying  to  make  up  in  forced  affection  for  difference  in 
ideals.  Ever  and  anon  the  parents  sent  them  a  pres- 
ent. Then,  touched  and  humble,  they  wrould  pay  a  state 
visit  home.  They  would  be  stared  at  and  pointed  out 
in  the  village.  The  conversation  with  their  brothers  and 
sisters  would  be  a  series  of  pin-pricks.  They  would 
strain  themselves  against  the  vacuum  between  them  in 
hypocritical  and  forced  enthusiasms,  and  retire  to 
Shanghai  at  last,  weary  and  miserable. 

"Damn  tomfoolery,  I  call  it,"  said  Topsy.    "Trying  to 


93 

feed  your  soul  on  that  kind  of  love  between  families  is 
like  chewing  saw-dust  for  food.  I  tell  you  what — some 
time  I  will  translate  Butler's  Way  of  All  Flesh  into 
Chinese,  with  Chinese  characters  and  scenes  and  all,  and 
you  shall  help  me.  It  will  be  good  for  your  soul." 

At  this  remark  Tistie  stirred  uneasily,  started  to 
speak,  and  thought  better  of  it.  Miss  Burton  had  named 
her  Tistie,  a  softened  form  of  the  word  statistics,  because 
of  her  studious  love  of  facts  and  figures.  She  was  one 
of  those  sober,  unimaginative,  duty-loving  souls,  who 
are  happiest  in  the  straight  and  simple  course  of  con- 
vention, but  who  often  find  themselves  placed  in  radical 
positions  through  sheer  process  of  logic.  With  her  par- 
ents' full  consent,  she  had  won  an  indemnity  scholar- 
ship, and,  after  her  undergraduate  course  was  finished, 
had  remained  in  America  to  take  her  Master's  degree. 
There  she  engaged  herself  to  a  fellow  student,  but  duti- 
fully waited  to  return  home  and  obtain  her  parents'  con- 
sent before  the  marriage.  But  when  he  reached  China, 
her  lover  found  that  his  parents,  who  were  somewhat 
liberal-minded,  had  so  far  fallen  from  grace  as  to  ar- 
range a  marriage  for  him.  This  contract  he  promptly 
repudiated,  saying  that  he  would  marry  the  girl  whom 
he  had  chosen.  Whereupon  her  parents,  getting  wind 
of  the  matter,  refused  to  be  a  party  to  such  a  proceed- 
ing. At  last,  being  a  somewhat  resolute  young  man, 
and  not  able  to  settle  the  matter  through  the  intermedi- 
ary of  posts  and  friends,  he  did  what  his  American  train- 
ing dictated,  and  came  to  call  on  his  lady  in  her  own 
village.  In  order  to  discuss  the  matter  quietly  they 
went  walking  together,  a  sober  and  proper  stroll  along 
the  bamboo  path  by  the  canal.  Though  this  was  quite  in 
accordance  with  the  customs  they  had  known  through 
all  the  later  days  of  their  schooling,  no  proper  Chinese 


94  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

girl  in  an  old-fashioned  community  goes  walking  with 
her  betrothed,  or  even  sees  him  before  the  wedding. 
Forthwith  a  scandal  ensued.  A  little  Chinese  paper 
took  the  matter  up,  with  the  most  vulgar  insinuations. 
Both  families  felt  absolutely  disgraced  and  the  girl's 
reputation  was  lost  forever.  To  try  to  live  it  down  in 
her  own  community  was  impossible.  Her  lover  promptly 
married  her  in  a  little  Methodist  chapel,  and  they  came 
to  live  in  the  British  quarter  of  Shanghai.  Here  Miss 
Burton  met  Tistie  and  offered  her  a  permanent  position 
as  her  secretary  and  assistant  in  turning  English  books 
into  Chinese.  Tistie  was  a  busy,  efficient,  earnest, 
scholarly  girl,  devoted  to  her  work.  But  the  imputa- 
tion of  scandal  had  left  a  scar  in  her  memory,  and  not 
all  her  own  reasoning,  nor  Miss  Burton's  reassuring 
friendship,  nor  Topsy's  sarcasm  could  rid  her  of  the 
shame  of  being  publicly  branded  as  a  wanton. 

I  did  not  gather  all  this  from  her,  save  indirectly 
through  arguments  with  Topsy.  My  scattered  infer- 
ences were  later  confirmed  and  welded  into  a  complete 
story  by  Miss  Burton.  As  for  Pearl,  the  other  girl  of 
the  group,  she  was  not  married.  'She  had  chosen  an 
even  more  difficult  course  than  that  of  the  outlaw  brides ; 
for  she  had  elected,  as  a  single  girl,  to  devote  herself  to 
what  we  would  call  district  nursing  among  the  poor 
Chinese,  and  was  agitating  for  the  establishment  of  a 
hospital  in  foreign  style  in  one  of  the  cities  near 
Shanghai.  A  simple,  Christian  girl,  she  shared  none  of 
the  radical  views  of  the  others.  She  believed  that 
daughters  should  devote  themselves  in  childhood  to  their 
parents,  and  to  their  husbands  and  parents-in-law  in 
maturity;  that  the  family  spirit  of  the  Chinese  had 
something  beautiful  in  it  and  no  selfish  individualism 
should  be  allowed  to  shatter  it;  that,  instead  of  break- 


OUTLAW  BRIDES  «)r> 

ing  away  from  her  home,  an  educated  girl  should,  in 
general,  remain  there,  and  try  to  win  over  the  others 
by  the  radiant  argument  of  a  beautiful,  loving,  and  un- 
selfish life. 

"But  you  are  not  doing  it,"  said  Topsy. 

"That  is  not  the  same,"  she  answered  in  her  slightly 
awkward  English.  "It  is  different.  I  am  vowed  to  a 
great  work,  to  the  rescue  of  thousands  of  little  children 
that  die,  and  no  mother's  heart,  though  loving,  intelli- 
gent, anywhere  to  care  for  them.  And,  like  a  nun,  I  must 
seek  the  kingdom  of  Heaven  first — it  is  not  for  my  own 
development,  not  for  my  freedom — it  is  for  the  great 
work,  the  terrible  need." 

"And  yet  your  parents  cast  you  out,"  said  Topsy. 
"You  cannot  work  from  your  home;  you  are  more  an 
outlaw  than  any  of  us." 

"That  is  my  cross,"  she  answered  quietly.  "I  love 
my  parents  and  I  pray  for  them,  and  one  day,  I  am 
confident,  the  Lord  Jesus  will  even  grant  that  I  may  go 
home,  and  see  my  mother's  face  once  again,  before  she 
die." 

In  the  midst  of  these  girls — only  a  few  out  of  many 
who  found  temporary  refuge,  employment,  advice,  and 
comfort  at  her  house — sat  the  woman  who  had  made  for 
herself  so  unique  a  life,  her  golden  hair  and  fair  rosy 
face  glowing  with  irrepressible  vitality.  Ardent,  vigor- 
ous, radical  by  every  instinct,  she  had  fallen  into  dis- 
grace with  the  more  conservative  members  of  the  mis- 
sion because  she  was  said  to  be  teaching  socialism,  the 
doctrine  of  evolution,  and  the  aesthetic  beauty  of  the 
Catholic  church  along  with  the  pure  word  of  the  gospel. 
Once  she  even  spoke  scornfully  of  some  one  who  wished 
to  translate  Pollyanna  into  Chinese,  suggesting  Topsy's 
favourite,  The  Way  of  All  Flesh,  instead.  But  the  Bishop 


96  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

had  come  to  her  rescue  and  had  found  an  opportunity 
for  her  to  superintend  the  translation  of  western  books 
into  Chinese,  both  for  the  Christian  Literature  Society 
and  for  progressive  Chinese  publishing  houses.  The 
actual  translation  she  felt  unable  to  do,  but  she  mapped 
out  the  scope  of  each  book,  condensed  or  expanded  the 
English  text  as  was  required,  and  interpreted  it  to 
Chinese  translators.  She  also  wrote  simple  text-books 
on  science  and  economics  and  social  history  to  be  trans- 
lated. With  a  little  patrimony  of  her  own,  she  had 
bought  this  pretty  house  and  settled  down  for  life  to  an 
interesting  and  ever  widening  career.  Her  intense  in- 
tellectual energy  and  warm,  loving  heart  were  appar- 
ently satisfied  in  being  a  city  of  refuge  to  all  young 
Chinese  who  suffered  for  their  ideas,  and  in  dispensing 
her  tasks  of  translation  as  a  kind  of  informal  endow- 
ment for  progressive  young  China. 

As  I  spoke  with  sympathy  and  hope  of  her  work 
and  theirs,  the  wonderful  work  of  the  awakening  youth 
of  these  old  lands,  their  speech  fell  into  a  graver  cadence. 
There  were  other  girls  who  were  less  lucky  in  revolt, 
they  said.  And  they  told  me  of  one.  She  was  a  beauti- 
ful girl,  wealthy  and  high-bred,  nursed  in  the  midst  of 
gorgeous  luxury,  with  servants  at  her  bidding  all  day 
long,  and  jewelry  enough  to  endow  a  school.  She  had 
all  that  money  and  love  could  give  her  except  what  she 
most  longed  for — a  western  education.  For  her  par- 
ents had  been  foolish  enough  to  get  her  a  grand  piano 
and  to  import  a  teacher  from  a  mission  school  for  rich 
mandarin  girls  to  teach  her  to  enjoy  it.  Among  culti- 
vated Chinese  foreign  music  is  rather  fashionable — so 
fashionable,  in  fact,  that  instruction  in  the  coveted  art 
of  the  piano  is  the  best  bait  of  the  mission  schools.  So 
it  happened  that  this  daughter  of  wealth  learned  much 


OUTLAW  BRIDES  07 

besides  the  strange  notes,  and  was  filled  with  glorious 
romantic  dreams  of  knowledge  that  lay  beyond  her 
garden  walls.  She  begged  her  parents  to  send  her  to 
school,  but  they  merely  offered  her  presents  and  a  hus- 
band, and  finally  compromised  on  a  little  tutoring  in 
the  Confucian  classics.  Her  dreams  throve  on  the  de- 
nial. The  rumors  of  girls  who  went  away  to  study  in 
America  became  glorious  possibilities  to  her  mind.  One 
day  she  stole  forth,  with  all  her  jewelry  done  up  in  a 
square  of  linen,  and,  in  a  closed  sedan-chair,  started 
in  the  direction  of  Shanghai.  How  she  got  so  far,  they 
could  not  tell;  for  she  knew  nothing  even  of  her  own 
people,  outside  of  her  servants.  What  happened  then 
no  one  knew.  She  had  apparently  told  her  ambitions 
to  a  Sikh  policeman,  and  asked  him  where  she  could 
turn  her  jewels  into  money  for  passage  to  America.  He 
took  her  with  him,  and  that,  for  a  time,  was  as  much 
as  her  parents  could  discover.  But  there  are  detective 
forces  in  the  Orient  which,  working  informally,  are 
quite  as  efficient  as  our  own  Secret  Service.  And  one 
day  this  Dorothy  Arnold  of  China  was  discovered — a 
doped  and  feverish  wreck  of  her  former  self,  swathed 
in  Indian  draperies  like  a  Sikh  woman,  drugged  almost 
beyond  memory  or  recognition  with  opium.  How  many 
men,  and  who,  had  shattered  the  chastity  which  a 
Chinese  woman  cherishes  as  much  as  any  woman  on 
earth,  no  one  could  tell.  In  the  utmost  secrecy  her  par- 
ents had  taken  her  home,  and  silence  shrouded  her.  But 
she  had  regained  some  clarity  of  mind  and  memory  now. 
Her  friends,  and  even  her  family,  thought  that  she  was 
waiting  for  an  opportunity  to  commit  suicide,  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  Chinese  sense  of  honour  in  such  cases, 
and  gravely  hoped  that  she  would. 

This  led  to  a  discussion  of  suicide  among  Chinese 


98  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

women.  And  the  midnight  hours  dragged  on  through  a 
strange  and  tragic  recital  of  the  suicides  that  they  knew 
of  among  girls  who  had  received  in  some  way  a  tincture 
of  western  ambition  and  learning,  and  ultimately  had 
been  thwarted  by  their  parents  and  forced  into  unwel- 
come betrothal. 

It  was  two  o'clock  before  I  stole  off  to  bed  at  last,  to 
dream  but  not  to  sleep.  For  into  the  midst  of  the  mem- 
ories of  that  strange  and  crowded  day,  there  stole  out 
of  the  heart  of  the  night  a  ghostly  voice  of  suffering.  It 
was  a  Chinese  mother  calling  back  the  soul  of  a  little 
child  who  had  died.  Across  the  meadows  it  sounded 
above  the  chorus  of  frogs,  through  all  the  hours  of  dark- 
ness. For  it  is  believed  that  the  little  soul  lingers  for 
some  time  in  the  presence  of  the  mother,  afraid  to 
venture  out  into  the  untried  paths  of  eternity.  And  if 
one  speaks  lovingly  to  it,  it  may  perchance  return,  and 
enter  again  into  the  little  unworn  body  and  live  out  its 
days  on  earth  safe  in  its  mother's  house.  So  all  night 
long  she  called,  and  the  cry  was  terrible  upon  the  rose- 
scented  night,  till  dawn  came  up,  solemn  and  silvery 
and  faintly  scarlet.  Then  apparently  the  little  ghost 
went  its  way,  and  the  hopes  of  the  mother  vanished  with 
the  morning. 


CHAPTER  XII 

HEART'S  BITTERNESS 

IN  the  confidences  of  the  outlaw  brides  I  had  touched 
the  springs  of  tears  in  this  new  hopeful  life  of  the  East. 
I  uncovered  them  again  when  I  went  next  day  to  dine 
with  the  daughters  of  the  aristocracy  in  a  Christian 
school  for  mandarin  girls. 

They  were  lovely  creatures,  these  high-bred  maidens, 
very  different  from  the  eager  souls  with  whom  I  had 
conversed  through  the  midnight  hours.  Their  fair  satin 
skin  and  long,  smooth  hair,  the  finished  modelling  and 
patrician  calm  of  their  young  faces,  the  silken  courtesy 
of  their  speech  and  manner,  marked  them  as  of  the 
"classes."  I  learned  the  quality  of  the  soul  that  could 
dwell  behind  that  delicate  exterior  when  "Miss  Grace," 
an  American  teacher,  brought  out  a  little  note-book 
written  in  English,  which  had  been  sent  to  the  school 
by  the  parents  of  a  favourite  graduate  who  had  died. 
No  doubt  she  had  used  the  alien  language  as  a  cipher 
with  which  to  conceal  her  thoughts  from  her  house- 
hold. It  was  a  diary,  recording  from  day  to  day  her 
struggles  after  perfection.  Devout  and  cultivated 
men  and  women  have  written  such  documents  in  all 
ages,  and  perhaps  there  is  nothing  that  reveals  the 
innate  distinction  or  vulgarity  of  a  soul  more  clearly 
than  these  out-pourings.  The  diary  of  this  girl,  in 
its  way,  was  not  unworthy  to  stand  with  the  best. 
Her  moral  standards  were  narrow,  and  at  times  even 
absurd.  The  effort  and  agony  she  spent  on  an  at- 

99 


100  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

tempt  to  keep  Sunday  sacred  in  a  household  which 
did  not  recognize  its  existence  was  worthy  of  more  con- 
structive social  effort.  Of  the  true  evils  of  the  world, 
of  the  wrongs  in  the  social  scheme  of  things  which  make 
private  virtue  too  often  abortive,  of  the  efforts  toward 
social  regeneration  which  interested  the  young  femin- 
ists, she  knew  nothing — and  nothing,  too,  of  the  great, 
raw  temptations  of  life,  of  the  forces  which  shake  the 
moral  foundations  of  being,  and  of  that  terrible,  de- 
vastating white  light  which,  in  a  crisis,  may  reveal  the 
emptiness,  the  cruelty  even,  of  the  very  ideals  to  which 
one  has  moulded  and  fashioned  one's  life  in  prayer  and 
self-abnegation.  Her  religious  faith  was  as  private  and 
exclusive  as  her  social  position.  She  had  taken  her 
ideals  from  the  mission  without  criticism  or  question, 
and  had  made  them  fuel  for  a  burning  spirit.  Written 
in  the  excellent,  though  slightly  formal  and  archaic  Eng- 
lish of  one  who  has  learned  the  language  well,  but  from 
books,  she  related  the  story  of  her  inward  self -discipline 
from  day  to  day. 

It  was  a  record  of  leisure  without  peace,  of  comfort 
without  contentment.  In  the  beautiful  house  to  which 
she  had  gone  as  a  bride,  she  lived  as  an  alien,  estranged 
by  her  Christian  faith  and  her  western  education  from 
the  life  to  which  social  custom  dedicated  her.  There 
were  summaries  of  lectures  from  her  mother-in-law,  a 
kindly,  bustling,  self-important  old  lady  who  obviously 
loved  her,  with  an  affection  captious,  reverent,  and 
patronizing.  Her  love  the  good  old  woman  expressed  in 
a  series  of  superstitious  doses  designed  to  hasten  the  ad- 
vent of  a  baby  son.  This  aroused  the  jealousy  of  another 
daughter-in-law,  also  childless,  a  vain  little  creature  who 
in  a  house  ruled  by  the  mother-in-law  had  obviously 
the  instincts  of  a  "teacher's  pet."  But  the  mother  re- 


HEART'S  BITTERNESS  101 

fused  to  be  interested  in  the  maternal  career  of  this 
little  butterfly;  and  the  ensuing  drama  was  recorded  in 
detail,  together  with  the  prayerful  resolves  of  the 
Christian  bride  to  keep  her  temper,  to  receive  the  pin- 
pricks of  jealousy  and  small  spite  with  dignity  and 
sweetness,  and  to  cultivate  "the  spirit  of  love"  in  the 
household. 

There  were  also  bitter,  troubled,  and  indirect  refer- 
ences to  the  intimate  relations  of  wifehood  and  the 
whole  experience  of  sex.  Once  she  marvelled  that  an 
experience  so  tiresome  and  humiliating  could  have  been 
so  great  a  temptation  to  the  world.  She  half  believed 
that  the  usual  conception  of  sex  as  an  element  of  pleas- 
ure in  life  is  only  a  gigantic  hoax,  which  has  endured 
so  long  that  no  one  has  the  courage  to  be  the  first  to 
reveal  the  lie.  She  speculated  upon  the  love  described 
in  European  stories,  and  wondered  if  her  misery  in  the 
wifely  relation  was  due  to  her  own  bad  heart  and 
"satanic  pride."  Restrained  and  covert  as  these  remarks 
were,  even  in  the  safety  of  the  English  language,  they 
seemed  not  the  outcry  of  a  frigid  woman,  but  only  of  a 
fastidious,  mismated  one,  the  more  miserable  for  her 
latent  capacity  for  love.  Once  she  recorded  rather 
cynically  her  husband's  interest  in  a  concubine,  remark- 
ing that  though  this  was  living  in  sin,  yet  sin  was  a 
state  from  which  a  Chinese  in  his  unregenerate  state 
could  hardly  hope  to  escape  anyway,  and  from  a  worldly 
point  of  view  she  could  not  help  being  glad  that  he  had 
some  comfort  to  compensate  him  for  a  dull  wife.  Much 
of  her  diary  was  made  up  of  vows  to  submit  herself  with 
grace  and  humility  to  her  husband's  attentions,  together 
with  punctilious  accounts  of  his  virtues,  and  corollary 
pledges  of  respect  to  her  mother-in-law,  for  whom  she 
had  a  genuine  affection.  She  pined  a  good  deal  for  her 


102  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

own  home,  especially  for  her  little  sister,  and  upbraided 
this  wandering  of  her  bad  heart,  reminding  herself 
that  where  her  husband  and  his  mother  were,  there 
should  her  love  and  duty  be  also. 

But  there  were  lovely  descriptions,  too,  of  moments 
of  prayer  and  meditation  beside  the  water-garden  in  the 
centre  of  the  house,  which  caught  the  passing  clouds 
by  day,  and  sometimes  the  face  of  the  moon  at  night, 
and  was  her  window  into  the  heart  of  nature.  Lovingly 
she  recorded  the  lives  of  the  little  creatures  who  lived 
in  the  water,  the  opening  of  flower  buds  day  by  day, 
and  even  the  ways  of  the  worms  and  insects  that  in- 
fested the  water-plants,  all  in  the  quaintest  mixture  of 
formal  biological  terms  acquired  at  school  and  allegori- 
cal fantasy  spun  out  of  her  own  undernourished  im- 
agination and  ethical  aspiration.  She  would  fashion 
her  life  like  the  lotus  flower,  she  wrote,  which  grows 
sweet  and  stainless  out  of  the  darkest  mud,  not  cold 
and  colourless  in  its  purity,  but  flushed  with  warm 
colour.  So  her  life  must  be  radiant  with  love,  though 
alone  and  apart  in  this  house.  But  in  a  fit  of  Puritan- 
ism, she  discarded  this  allegory,  as  of  Buddhist  origin, 
and  recorded  that  her  heart  was  only  a  noxious  sink- 
hole, out  of  which  it  were  vain  to  expect  any  pure  blos- 
som. Confined  to  her  studies  of  the  garden  pool,  and 
to  infrequent  recreations  among  the  twisted  trees  and 
the  grotesque  meteoric  rocks  of  a  little  park,  she  longed 
for  the  great  open  spaces  which  she  knew  of  only 
through  English  books,  for  the  desert  and  the  plains, 
for  the  mountains  and  the  sea.  There  she  thought  her 
spirit  might  grow  quiet  at  last. 

Remembering  the  ideals  of  the  Christian  teachers,  she 
longed,  too,  for  some  opportunity  to  be  of  real  service 
in  life,  to  work  and  to  help  in  the  great  world.  In  her 


HEART'S  BITTERNESS  103 

occasional  journeys  through  the  city  in  a  closed  sedan- 
chair,  she  peeped  out  upon  the  terrible  crowds  of  the 
leprous,  the  starving,  the  blind.  They  became  an  ob- 
session with  her,  till  she  had  no  mind  for  anything  else, 
and  she  prayed  for  them  and  all  their  ills  in  pathological 
detail.  Daily  she  pleaded  with  her  family  to  be  allowed 
to  assist  once  a  week  at  a  mission  where  one  of  her  fa- 
vourite teachers  was  interested  in  something  like  settle- 
ment work.  The  diary  ended  with  a  jubilant  note,  say- 
ing that  she  had  at  last  been  permitted  to  do  this  won- 
derful work,  under  due  escort  from  home. 

"And  then?"  I  asked. 

"She  caught  smallpox  from  one  of  the  poor  people 
who  came  to  the  mission,  and  died  within  a  month/' 
answered  the  teacher. 

So  ended  this  touching,  abortive  life. 

"Her  own  family  mourned  her  as  they  almost  never 
mourn  daughters  in  this  land,"  added  Miss  Grace.  "Her 
brother  had  died  just  before,  and  there  is  no  one  left 
but  the  little  sister.  And  you  never  saw  a  child  so  loved. 
She  came  here  for  awhile,  but  they  took  her  away  be- 
cause they  could  not  bear  her  out  of  their  sight,  and 
they  are  treating  her  just  as  if  she  were  an  adored 
and  only  son,  instead  of  a  girl,  trying  almost  to  make 
a  son  of  her  by  force  of  love.  She  is  to  inherit  all  their 
wealth ;  and  they  are  looking  for  a  husband  for  her  who 
will  come  and  live  with  them  and  be  adopted  by  them, 
so  that  she  will  never  go  away  from  home." 

She  then  asked  me  if  I  would  like  to  see  the  little 
mission  Sunday  School  which  some  of  the  Christian 
girls  maintained  for  the  street  urchins.  "It  is  wonder- 
ful to  see  girls  who  are  so  rich  and  comfortable  in  life 
themselves  learn  to  care  for  the  less  fortunate,"  she 
added  with  a  pretty  air  of  piety. 


104 

I  thought  to  myself  that  it  was  a  good  narcotic,  at 
least,  to  dope  into  harmlessness  these  fresh  young  con- 
sciences that  might  otherwise  make  trouble  in  the  world. 
And  I  went  somewhat  cynically  to  the  mission  Sunday 
School  that  afternoon.  It  was  a  simple  little  chapel, 
financed  and  managed  by  the  rich  girls  of  the  school 
with  the  assistance  of  some  young  preachers  in  the  theo- 
logical seminary.  Between  the  girls  and  their  masculine 
assistants  everything  proceeded  with  charming  for- 
mality. There  was  none  of  the  chaffing,  the  flirtations 
in  the  choir  loft  and  the  church  kitchen,  which  in  our 
own  land  relieve  the  solemnity  of  Christian  Endeavours 
and  Epworth  Leagues.  The  girls  moved  in  little  flocks, 
chaperoning  each  other  and  seldom  venturing  to  stray 
into  the  presence  of  the  demure  young  preachers 
alone. 

Wandering  in  by  twos  and  threes,  with  bashful,  side- 
wise  glances,  the  slum  children  perched  on  the  edge 
of  the  benches  as  if  poised  for  flight.  At  the  door 
stood  a  ragged  crew,  wishing,  yet  fearing  to  come  in. 
They  were  wise  and  frowsy  little  things,  and  they  looked 
upon  their  teachers  with  the  unconscious  cynicism  with 
which  little  children  the  world  over  look  upon  sweet 
young  ladies  who  teach  them  golden  texts. 

The  services  were  long,  and  one  young  preacher  was 
determined  to  add  his  own  sermon  to  the  private  efforts 
of  the  maidens.  The  children  stirred  and  yawned,  and 
surreptitiously  kicked  each  other's  shins,  while  their 
teachers  turned  grave,  surprised  olive  eyes  upon  them. 
These  girls  themselves  seemed  the  children — all  fresh 
and  innocent  with  the  innocence  of  a  sheltered  class — 
and  the  children  seemed  their  elders,  sophisticated,  cun- 
ning, incredulous.  Some  of  the  youngsters  concentrated 
on  a  variety  of  moves  and  countermoves  against  each 


CJ 

i 

o 

Cfl 


J2 

2-, 


a 
U 

H 


HEART'S  BITTERNESS  105 

other's  peace  and  comfort,  under  the  seats,  while  others 
obviously  meditated  exit.  Coming  to  the  mission  Sun- 
day School  was  indeed  the  excitement  of  their  young 
lives.  But  no  sooner  were  they  there  than  they  longed 
to  be  out.  The  warm  air,  the  scent  of  the  peonies  on  the 
altar,  the  flow  of  words  unheeded  weighed  upon  them. 

Suddenly  there  was  the  sound  of  music.  Every  eye 
lighted.  It  was  a  funeral,  a  big  one!  A  Chinese  funeral 
is  a  fine  substitute  for  a  circus  parade.  It  calls  to  the 
young  like  a  fire.  The  preacher  raised  his  voice  in 
earnest  protest,  and  then,  forgetting  himself  for  a  mo- 
ment on  the  wings  of  his  own  words,  stopped  suddenly 
and  looked  around  aghast.  Every  seat  was  empty. 
Yet  I  thought  that  there  was  just  a  shade  of  relief  in 
his  manner.  Perhaps  he,  too,  was  glad  to  be  released 
from  the  sermon.  Perhaps  he  was  not  wholly  above 
funerals. 

The  young  teachers  hesitated.  They  were  not  quite 
so  interested  in  this  form  of  entertainment.  The  music 
continued — the  tramp,  tramp,  tramp  of  many  feet,  the 
wail  of  Chinese  instruments  and  the  rhythm  of  an  Occi- 
dental band  contending,  in  discords,  with  a  drum  and 
an  automobile  horn.  It  was  a  very  big  funeral,  they 
whispered,  and  clustered  at  the  door,  deprecating, 
watching  from  afar,  gay  little  figures  in  their  pink 
satin  trousers,  demure  and  soft-voiced. 

It  was  such  a  funeral  as  Shanghai  did  not  often  see. 
All  that  wealth  and  foreign  civilization  could  add  to 
Chinese  ceremonial  was  there,  the  utmost  flash  of 
colours,  the  utmost  blare  of  music,  the  parade  of  every 
vehicle  known  to  man.  First  came  an  escort  of  men  in 
uniform  on  horseback.  Then  followed  coolies  in  white, 
bearing  biers  piled  with  flowers,  and  thereafter  a  series 
of  structures  like  small  Chinese  pagodas  decorated  with 


106  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

red  streamers,  borne  on  the  shoulders  of  men  dressed  in 
red  and  white. 

By  that  time  all  the  crowd  was  murmuring.  It  was 
for  the  death  of  a  child,  some -one  said.  An  only  child, 
and  an  heir.  So  many  were  the  lives  of  men,  so  many 
the  trappings  and  ornaments  and  treasures  that  the  par- 
ents could  conjure  to  their  service;  yet  they  could  not 
keep  one  little  life  in  their  midst ! 

Still  the  procession  continued,  though  it  seemed  that 
all  the  streets  of  Shanghai  must  now  be  full  of  those 
who  had  passed  on  with  prancing  horses  and  mountains 
of  flowers.  There  still  were  priests  to  come — Taoist 
priests  in  robes  of  Yale  blue  silk,  with  hats  like  academic 
mortar  boards  on  their  heads,  Buddhist  priests  in  yellow 
veiled  with  black,  shaven-pated.  After  them  came  the 
bearers  of  the  household  gods,  silly,  abject,  waxen  crea- 
tures inanely  nodding  amidst  plants  and  verdure.  Lastly 
came  men  in  red  who  bore  a  great  banner,  gaudy,  hiero- 
glyphic. And  the  girls  exclaimed  wonderingly : 

"It  says,  on  that  banner,  'I.  H.  S.,  the  Church  of  Jesus 
Christ.' " 

The  little  soul  was  to  undergo  no  risks  on  its  un- 
earthly journey.  Taoist  demons,  and  Buddhist  saints, 
and  the  gods  of  the  household,  and  Jesus  himself,  were 
all  conscripted  to  serve  it  and  make  safe  its  path. 

Then  came  a  slow  procession  of  automobiles,  some 
piled  with  flowers  and  treasures,  all  decked  with  red  and 
white  as  for  a  festival,  containing  mourners  in  white. 
Behind  them  came  more  men  on  horseback,  leading  a 
gorgeous  procession  of  banners.  Every  firm  or  insti- 
tution that  the  family  were  connected  with  had  its  own 
gonfalon.  Banks,  ware-houses,  steamships,  railroads, 
government  posts  marched  by  in  symbol,  honouring 
the  little  life. 


HEART'S  BITTERNESS  107 

Suddenly  one  of  the  girls  gave  a  cry:  "That  is  the 
banner  of  our  school." 

And  others  whispered,  "It  is  she — she  died/'  awe- 
struck and  stunned.  Then  I  understood.  It  was 
the  little  sister  of  the  Christian  bride  whose  diary  I 
had  read,  the  only  little  sister,  for  whom  she  had  pined 
in  the  loneliness  of  wedlock,  and  who,  after  her  death, 
had  been  crowned  with  the  honour  and  glory  of  sonship. 

So  the  procession  passed  till  all  Shanghai  blazed  with 
it,  and  the  scent  of  funeral  flowers  was  heavy  and  sweet 
on  the  city  air — a  passionate  parade  of  family  wealth, 
a  flinging  of  splendour,  defiant,  into  the  face  of  death— 
and  then  at  last — the  little  white  hearse. 

Behind  it  only  one  coach  came  straggling.  In  it  a 
woman  in  white  silk  knelt  with  face  pressed  against 
the  seat,  her  shoulders  heaving  with  sobs. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

HIS  AMERICAN  MARRIAGE 

EARLY  next  morning  I  turned  my  face  to  the  North. 
But,  though  Peking  was  my  goal,  I  lingered  for  a  day 
in  the  beautiful  old  city  of  Soochow.  Soochow  differs 
from  Shanghai  as  Boston  differs  from  Chicago.  It  is 
quiet  and  simple,  and  its  society  and  its  culture  are  very 
old  and  hidden  from  the  eyes  of  the  passing  stranger. 
Yet  he  who  runs  most  swiftly  may  still  read  its  sober, 
crumbling  beauty,  and  its  essential  wealth — read  them 
in  the  rice-fields  and  the  rich  mulberry  plantations  that 
lie  all  about;  in  the  thwack,  thwack,  thwack  of  the  silk 
looms  illumining  every  dingy  cottage  with  fabric  deli- 
cate as  the  markings  of  frost ;  in  the  laden  junks  that  go 
up  and  down  beneath  the  circular  arched  bridges  of  the 
Grand  Canal;  and  in  the  sober  and  cultivated  life  of 
old  families  who  are,  in  many  cases,  the  descendants 
of  mandarins  who  won  literary  honours  here  when  this 
was  the  intellectual  capital  of  the  empire. 

Here  are  no  paved  streets  for  the  Eolls  Eoyce,  nor 
passage  even  for  rickshaws.  But  on  the  backs  of  donkeys 
all  hung  with  bells  like  a  winter  sleigh,  and  pursued 
by  a  yelling  boy  with  a  big  stick,  one  may  career  in  state 
among  the  bazaars.  But  mostly  the  highways  are  the 
canals.  Like  their  Venetian  counterparts  these  canals 
are  most  pestilential  institutions,  but  picturesque  to  a 
degree.  All  afternoon  I  slipped  from  one  to  another, 
watching  the  life  of  the  city  pass  before  me  like  a  mov- 
ing picture.  From  garden  to  pagoda  I  went,  in  my  little 

108 


HIS  AMERICAN  MARRIAGE  100 

houseboat,  and  out  into  the  silk  country  where  threads 
of  silk  were  hung  like  spun  glass  from  one  twisted  tree  to 
another.  I  presented  myself  with  an  introduction  to  a 
rich  man's  house,  and  saw  an  environment  like  that  in 
which  the  Christian  bride  had  worn  out  her  life.  The 
house  consisted  of  endless  series  of  rooms,  not  wide  or 
large  as  we  count  space,  but  intricately  and  beautifully 
carved  and  lacquered,  and  furnished  with  black  ebony 
tables  and  quadrangular  stools,  placed  stiffly  about  the 
walls.  The  more  intimate  rooms  I  did  not  see.  The 
pussy-footed  servant  led  me  only  among  those  empty 
and  public,  unrolling  here  a  beautiful  painting,  and 
there  a  piece  of  embroidery,  almost  jewel-like  in  the 
clarity  and  brilliance  of  its  colours.  The  rooms  were 
built  around  courts,  and  in  the  midst  of  the  house  was 
the  water-garden.  Though  they  breed  germs  and  are 
little  infernos  of  mosquitoes,  I  never  failed  to  feel  in 
these  water-gardens,  on  which  the  inner  verandas  of 
a  Chinese  house  open,  a  singular  beauty  and  romance. 
As  I  walked  among  these  stiff,  beautiful  apartments,  and 
out  upon  the  balcony  over  the  pool,  I  pictured  the  daily 
routine  of  the  Christian  bride  and  all  the  living  details 
of  her  domestic  imprisonment.  Vastly  uncomfortable 
as  the  house  seemed,  it  was  yet  a  symbol  of  domestic 
culture  and  dignity. 

I  wandered,  too,  in  such  a  garden  as  she  had  described, 
among  quiet  pools,  and  rockeries,  and  twisted  trees,  and 
tea-houses,  and  arching  bridges.  This,  then,  had  been 
her  world,  a  little  world,  cramped  and  irritating  to  one 
who  has  breathed  of  the  winds  of  the  West  that  now 
blow  over  this  old  land,  but  beautiful  and  fine  in  its 
still,  inward  way.  Yet,  when  I  heard  the  Americans 
of  Soochow  discussing  an  American  bride  who  had  come 
with  her  well-born  Chinese  husband  Jo  such  a  house, 


110  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

charmed  by  tales  of  Oriental  princeliness  of  life,  my 
heart  was  still  with  very  horror. 

Of  her  I  learned  nothing,  except  that  the  Americans 
in  Soochow  were  distressed  about  her,  believing  her  un- 
happy, and  indeed  well-nigh  desperate,  yet  having  no 
means  of  communication  with  her.  But  one  man  told 
me  in  some  detail  of  another  American  girl  in  another 
city,  married  to  a  rich  and  cultivated  Chinese  whom  she 
had  met  in  the  United  States.  She  had  been  a  belle  in 
a  university  town,  the  daughter  of  liberal-minded  peo- 
ple of  some  substance,  who  were  patrons  of  the  Cosmo- 
politan Club.  After  the  Revolution  in  China  had 
aroused  such  wide-spread  interest  in  the  aspirations  of 
the  young  republic,  her  father  had  fallen  in  the  way 
of  inviting  young  Chinese  students  to  Sunday  dinner. 

"We  think  ourselves  civilized,"  he  would  say.  "Do 
you  know  that  these  young  men's  ancestors  wTere  civi- 
lized three  thousand  years  before  we  ever  began  to  think 
about  it?" 

He  became  a  diligent  student  of  Chinese  art  and  Con- 
fucian ethics.  It  was  the  first  intellectual  hobby  he  had 
had  sirice  he  graduated  from  the  university  some  twenty 
years  before.  He  would  enlarge  upon  the  fine  manners 
of  these  young  men,  their  punctiliousness  in  acknowl- 
edging hospitality  with  gifts. 

"They  come  among  us  as  nobodies,"  he  would  say, 
"but  you  don't  know  what  great  connections  they  have 
at  home.  More  birth  and  breeding  than  the  king  of 
England,  sir!" 

And  all  the  while  his  young  daughter  sat  like  Desde- 
mona,  drinking  in  the  discussions  of  art  and  politics,  the 
quaint  descriptions  of  life  in  their  Chinese  homes — till 
one  day  she  announced  to  her  father  that  she  was  going 
to  marry  the  young  man  who  was  his  favourite  guest. 


HIS  AMERICAN  MARRIAGE  111 

It  was  something  of  a  blow  to  him.  He  had  not  reckoned 
upon  that  method  of  showing  his  appreciation  of  this 
ancient  people,  and  pictured  his  prospective  grandchil- 
dren in  some  dismay.  But  the  young  man  was  rich  and 
suave,  and  in  love;  and  the  vanity  of  princely  connec- 
tions, though  Oriental,  somewhat  softened  his  instinctive 
objections.  So  he  consented  at  last,  and  made  a  virtue 
of  his  freedom  from  race-prejudice,  boasting  mildly  at 
the  Town  and  Gown  Club  of  his  son-in-law's  relatives 
and  achievements. 

The  son-in-law  was  indeed  an  exemplary  young  man, 
a  gentleman  and  a  scholar,  as  all  the  faculty  said.  To  do 
him  justice  he  warned  his  new  wife  of  the  pitfalls  she 
would  meet  in  his  land,  and  it  was  her  eagerness  rather 
than  his  that  carried  the  marriage  through.  But  all  her 
empty  little  soul  was  thrilled  with  the  romance  of  this 
Oriental  bridal.  Visions  of  eastern  splendour,  as  gor- 
geously mixed  as  Chu  Chin  Chow.,  floated  through  her 
mind,  and  were  confirmed  by  the  silks  and  embroideries 
that  began  to  arrive  from  China  for  her  trousseau.  She 
told  him  that  his  people  should  be  her  people,  and  vowed 
her  willingness  to  sacrifice  every  custom  of  her  own. 
Poor  young  man,  what  could  he  do?  After  all,  he  could 
not  picture  all  the  details  of  an  American  woman's  life, 
nor  gauge  the  Occidental  girl's  capacity  for  such  sub- 
jection. Her  humility  was  so  beautiful  in  his  eyes,  so 
Confucian  in  its  self-annihilation,  so  unlike  all  he  had 
heard  of  American  women,  that  he  trusted  to  it  to  con- 
ciliate his  parents  and  gild  his  unpopular  marriage. 
His  father,  at  least,  was  a  man  of  the  world,  and  had 
so  far  adopted  Western  ways  as  to  refrain  from  ar- 
ranging a  betrothal  for  his  son. 

So  the  girl  came  to  an  old  and  aristocratic  city  of 
China,  and  entered  as  a  daughter-in-law  into  an  old  and 


112 

aristocratic  family.  They  did  not  approve  of  the  match, 
were  indeed  deeply  disappointed,  but  they  treated  her 
not  unkindly.  Her  husband  had  not  misrepresented 
their  wealth  and  importance  according  to  old  Chinese 
standards.  But  at  first  sight  of  her  new  home  all  dreams 
of  Oriental  splendour  vanished.  The  rooms  were  small, 
cramped,  and  bare,  and,  though  there  was  a  beauty  and 
preciousness  of  detail  such  as  no  plutocrat  of  America 
can  achieve,  her  taste  was  not  trained  to  recognize  or 
appreciate  it,  nor  to  know  the  pricelessness  of  things 
she  handled.  She  would  have  given  the  whole  house  for 
an  American  bath-room.  The  lack  of  sanitary  con- 
veniences irritated  and  shamed  her,  and  from  the  human 
stench  of  the  Chinese  city,  an  emanation  that  must  have 
been  as  characteristic  of  Athens  and  old  London  as  it 
is  of  China,  and  has  vanished  only  with  modern  plumb- 
ing, she  shrank  in  horror. 

But  these  were  the  least  of  her  troubles.  She  who  at 
home  had  had  her  own  little  car  in  which  she  moved 
about  the  town  day  or  night  unchaperoned ;  who  had  pur- 
sued her  own  courses  unquestioned  since  she  was  fifteen, 
and  had  never  once  obeyed  her  mother  since  at  twelve  she 
flatly  refused  to  wear  her  rubbers ;  who  disregarded  most 
conventions  when  she  wished,  with  her  parents'  teasing 
connivance — who  was,  in  short,  the  typical  spoiled 
daughter  of  kindly,  indulgent,  well-to-do  parents  in  a 
small  American  city — found  herself  reduced  to  rigorous, 
unquestioning  obedience  to  an  old  Chinese  woman,  and 
every  movement  and  impulse  regulated  by  the  traditions 
of  thousands  of  years.  Like  most  American  girls  of  her 
type,  she  had  looked  forward  to  throwing  off  the  last 
remnants  of  authority  when  she  was  married,  to  possess- 
ing a  little  house  of  which  she  was  mistress,  and  for 
which  she  chose  furnishings  in  accordance  with  tastes 


HIS  AMERICAN  MARRIAGE  113 

secretly  cherished  but  ungratified  at  home,  and  to  con- 
trolling her  husband  as  a  willing  slave  and  vassal  to  the 
caprices  of  her  love.  She  had  not  quite  rid  herself  of 
the  idea  that  this  old  Chinese  palace  of  which  she 
dreamed  would  be  hers  to  renovate,  and  to  supply  with 
bath-rooms  and  sleeping  porches,  and  if  her  husband 
retained  any  inconvenient  Oriental  notions,  she  expected 
in  time  to  wheedle  them  out  of  him. 

But  not  only  was  not  anything  in  the  house  hers,  nor 
any  opinion  regarded — her  husband  was  not  even  hers. 
Her  demonstrations  of  affection  were  regarded  as  gross 
wantonness ;  she  was  expected  to  remember  every  minute 
that  he  belonged  first  to  his  mother,  and  was  hers  only  in 
the  physical  relation  of  wifehood;  and  that  next  to  his 
mother  there  were  half  a  dozen  members  of  the  house- 
hold who,  by  reason  of  seniority  or  other  pre-eminence, 
had  first  claim  upon  his  notice  and  consideration.  In 
the  common  groups  of  the  household  they  met  as 
strangers,  and  even  in  the  privacy  that  no  one  could 
take  from  her,  he  nightly  hardened  his  heart  against 
her  complaints,  as  the  old  ties  of  family  and  the  old 
code  of  ethics  regained  control  of  him.  No  one  treated 
her  with  cruelty,  but  she  felt  herself  a  barbarian  among 
them,  wanton  and  shameless  in  her  love  for  her  hus- 
band, lawless  and  crude  in  every  impulse,  and  from 
minute  to  minute  she  was  being  invisibly  moulded  and 
chained,  as  it  seemed,  to  death  itself. 

Her  freedom  was  wholly  gone.  She  could  not  move 
out  of  the  house  alone.  She  did  all  things  with  the 
daughters-in-laws  in  flocks  and  herds.  Vaguely  she  heard 
of  other  Americans  in  the  city,  but  she  had  no  means 
of  getting  in  touch  with  them.  She  wrote  home  appeal- 
ing for  her  parents'  aid  in  leaving  this  "daily  hell,"  but 
her  husband  read  the  letter,  and  insisted  that  she  should 


114  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

send  one  which  he  dictated,  saying  that  she  was  well 
and  was  learning  to  be  a  good  wife.  Thereafter  he  was 
her  only  intermediary  with  the  outer  world.  As  her  dis- 
content became  obvious,  the  chains  were  drawn  tighter, 
lest  she  should  run  away  and  create  a  scandal,  and  the 
family  lose  face. 

Then  her  baby  was  born,  and  it  was  a  little  girl  baby. 
Three  hours  after  its  birth  it  was  found  strangled  at 
her  breast,  and  herself  dead  in  a  pool  of  blood.  She 
had  killed  it  herself,  and  then,  by  wrenching  and  strain- 
ing, had  brought  on  a  hemorrhage.  Her  story  was 
known  through  a  letter  she  smuggled  out,  addressed  to 
the  American  consul,  through  the  intermediary  of  the 
Occidental  physician  whose  attendance  at  childbirth 
had  been  permitted  as  a  special  concession. 

The  melancholy  of  this  terrible  tale  lingered  with  me 
all  day,  and  somewhat  poisoned  the  beauty  of  Soochow, 
darkening  my  mind,  even  as  I  climbed  the  pagoda  to  the 
top,  and  ascended  higher  and  higher  among  Buddhas 
that  gleamed  soberly  from  the  dust,  and  wind-blown 
bells  that  faintly  tinkled  among  the  eaves.  And  the 
shadow  of  it  was  on  the  quiet  waters  of  the  canal,  as 
the  sun  died  in  a  flush  of  rose-colour  above  the  green  and 
misty  country-side,  and  the  boy  came  bearing  jasmine- 
flower  tea  and  almond  cakes  for  my  refreshment.  Then 
I  turned  my  face  to  Peking. 

Two  days  and  two  nights  beyond  Soochow  it  lay — by 
the  swiftest  route  that  western  engineers  could  build. 
For  me  they  were  days  of  strange  loneliness.  Shut  in 
my  little  railway  compartment,  I  swung  through  that 
vast  green  land,  league  after  league  after  league  of  it 
sinking  behind  me,  and  always,  it  seemed,  the  landscape 
grew  wider  and  more  sombre.  The  bamboo  and  the  rice- 
fields  vanished,  and  the  warm  mist  of  the  South  changed 


HIS  AMERICAN  MARRIAGE  115 

to  crystal  sunlight.  On  the  second  morning  the  air  that 
blew  through  my  window  was  fresh  with  the  sweetness 
of  a  northern  June.  During  that  time  I  had  only  my 
thoughts  for  company,  and  the  memories  of  home  now 
so  far  away  that  it  seemed  scarcely  more  real  than  some- 
thing I  had  read  about  in  a  book.  So  I  sped  onward 
in  a  dream,  for  the  loneliness  and  the  perpetual  motion 
and  the  swift  flight  of  the  landscape  without,  and  the 
everlasting  succession  of  yellow  beings  who  came  and 
looked  at  me  and  left  tea  and  went  away,  acted  on  my 
mind  like  a  species  of  hypnotism. 

But  it  was  not  granted  me  to  enter  the  visionary  old 
city  of  Peking  in  a  visionary  mood. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE  RESCUE  OF  LITTLE  MUM 

"GOD  looks  out  for  fools  and  children,"  says  the  old 
proverb.  And  for  wanderers,  too,  I  think.  Only  a  three- 
fold blessing  could  explain  Little  Mum,  and  the  be- 
ginning and  end  of  the  fortunes  she  linked  with  mine. 

I  had  been  dumped  out  in  Tientsin,  in  the  gleaming 
dust  of  sunset,  to  await  the  express  to  Peking.  The  ex- 
press, it  seemed,  had  already  gone,  and  there  was  not 
another  till  morning.  Here  was  a  dilemma.  I  did  not 
have  enough  money  to  risk  an  overnight  stop  in  Tientsin, 
among  strangers.  Somehow  I  must  get  to  Peking  that 
night. 

While  I  was  meditating  on  this  crisis  in  my  affairs, 
and  taking  private  stock  of  my  cash,  a  plaintive  voice 
said,  in  the  meticulous  English  which  marks  the  Euro- 
pean who  has  learned  it  as  a  foreign  language,  "Pardon 
me,  but  how  can  I  reach  Peking?" 

"That,"  said  I,  "is  what  I  should  like  to  know." 

Then  I  stopped  in  utter  amazement.  What  walking 
doll-shop  was  this?  A  slim,  flaxen-haired  little  creature, 
for  all  the  world  like  a  doll  the  worse  for  wear,  stood 
before  me.  In  her  arms  she  carried  a  flaxen-haired  mite. 
Another,  perhaps  two  years  old,  was  clinging  to  her 
skirts.  A  third,  a  rosy  little  girl,  was  making  a  face 
at  me  from  among  a  shower  of  golden  ringlets.  And  a 
fourth,  who  was  possibly  five  years  old,  with  bushy  yel- 
low bobbed  hair,  and  a  round  sailor  hat,  stood  like 
Buster  Brown,  excogitating  mischief. 

"You  see,"  she  continued  earnestly,  "I  must  surely 

116 


THE  EESCUE  OP  LITTLE  MUM  117 

come  into  Peking  to-night.  I  must  find  my  husband. 
I  am  bringing  my  children  to  find  my  husband." 

Her  children!  I  surveyed  the  little  thing  in  amaze- 
ment. She  did  not  look  seventeen. 

"But  surely,  if  your  husband  knows  that  you  are  com- 
ing— "  I  began. 

She  interrupted  and  began  to  explain  eagerly.  He 
did  not  know.  He  had  left  her  behind  in  Shanghai, 
saying  that  he  would  send  for  her.  She  had  heard  no 
more  of  him.  All  she  knew  was  that  he  worked  in  a 
Danish  firm  in  Peking,  but  she  had  forgotten  the  name 
and  address.  Left  alone  in  Shanghai,  she  had  found 
her  money  running  low,  and  was  afraid  to  stay  on  in 
that  great  city.  So  without  a  nurse,  without  any  assist- 
ance whatsoever,  she  had  set  out  with  her  children  to 
find  him.  With  four  children  under  five,  one  of  them 
a  nursing  baby,  she  had  come  two  days  and  two  nights 
on  a  Chinese  railway,  among  men  who  could  not  speak 
her  language,  under  circumstances  utterly  strange  to 
her.  But  somehow  she  had  done  it.  She  had  nursed 
them  and  fed  them  and  scrubbed  them  continuously, 
as  one  must  on  these  grimy  roads,  and  had  brought  them 
safe  thus  far.  It  was  plain  that  she  could  not  carry  on 
much  farther. 

She  must  get  to  Peking  that  very  night,  she  assured 
me  earnestly  as  a  postscript  to  the  tale,  because  she  had 
no  money,  and  darkness  was  coming  on,  and  she  did  not 
know  where  to  go  in  Tientsin. 

She  broke  off  to  cry  fretfully,  "Bobby,  Bobby,  please, 
Bobby,  come  back." 

Bobby  was  serenely  marching  off,  with  his  hand  trust- 
ingly in  that  of  a  kindly  Chinese.  I  ran  after  Bobby  and 
detached  him,  to  the  accompaniment  of  inarticulate, 
smiling  apologies  from  the  Chinese. 


118  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

"I  will  take  Bobby  around  the  station  with  me,"  I 
said,  holding  fast  to  his  resisting  hand,  "and  see  what 
I  can  find  out — that  is  if  any  one  speaks  English  in  this 
bally  place." 

"Oh,  thank  you,"  she  started  to  say,  and  broke  off  to 
cry,  in  horrified  tones,  "Karin,  get  up." 

Karin,  the  two-year-old,  having  got  rather  weary,  was 
lying  on  her  back  in  the  dust,  licking  the  dust  on  one 
little  hand  and  wiping  it  off  with  her  pink  skirt.  One 
could  see  germs  of  cholera,  leprosy,  smallpox,  and  all 
the  bacteria  that  infest  a  Chinese  city,  walking  visibly 
into  her  little  rosy  mouth.  I  picked  up  Karin  and  at- 
tached her  to  my  other  hand. 

With  these  two  I  set  forth  to  discover  what  I  could. 
Plainly  now  I  must  get  to  Peking  that  night.  There, 
at  least,  I  had  introductions  and  could  obtain  money, 
and  so  represent  some  kind  of  security  to  this  odd  and 
friendless  little  crew.  I  had  some  difficulty  dragging 
Bobby  and  Karin  along.  They  kicked  and  fought  and 
even  bit  my  hand  like  little  untrained  animals  and 
cried  "Mum,  Mum.  I  want  Little  Mum,"  all  the  way. 
But  between  attempts  to  tame  them  into  friendli- 
ness, I  discovered  that  there  was  a  train  with  a  gaso- 
line engine  that  was  starting  for  Peking  shortly  and 
would  arrive  there  at  two  in  the  morning.  Apparently 
all  other  foreigners  had  been  fortunate  enough  to  catch 
the  express.  We  were  alone  in  our  predicament. 

I  arranged  for  a  compartment;  then  I  looked  around 
for  something  to  eat.  There  seemed  nothing  at  all  to 
purchase.  I  returned  to  Little  Mum.  I  found  her  in  a 
state  verging  on  tears.  Nora  had  disappeared. 

I  put  Bobby's  hand  in  that  of  his  mother,  and  told  her 
on  no  account  to  let  him  go,  and  lifting  Karin,  protest- 
ing, in  my  arms,  I  started  off  to  find  Nora.  Having  had 


119 

some  experience  with  my  own  blonde  head,  I  guessed 
that  even  in  a  sophisticated  city  like  this  I  should  find 
her  the  cynosure  of  wondering  eyes.  And  I  did.  I  soon 
spied  afar  off  a  crowd  of  Chinese  gathered  as  if  about 
a  street  show,  and  in  the  middle  stood  Nora,  stamping, 
screaming,  furiously  shaking  her  curls,  making  the  most 
astounding  display  of  naughty  faces  that  I  ever  saw,  and 
heaping  a  marvellous  flood  of  invective,  half-English, 
half-Danish,  on  these  strange  beings  who  understood 
not  a  word,  but  who  were  to  her,  no  doubt,  like  ogres. 

The  Chinese  were  doing  nothing.  They  were  merely 
staring  at  her  with  kind,  wondering  faces.  I  rescued 
Nora  and  took  her  back  to  her  mother;  then  I  stowed 
them  all  and  their  twelve  pieces  of  baggage  into  the  first- 
class  compartment  I  had  acquired,  and  squeezed  myself 
in  after  them.  Slowly  the  train  pulled  out  of  Tientsin. 

I  looked  out  over  the  city.  The  sun  was  setting.  A 
strange  grey  desolate  city  it  seemed,  without  form  or 
comeliness,  surrounded  by  grey  wastes  over  which  the 
dust  now  sparkled  and  twinkled,  shot  with  long  shafts 
of  sunlight  that  were  full  of  fine  little  red  sparkles  like 
fire.  Beyond  lay  Peking,  and  I  thought  of  all  the  cara- 
vans that  had  gone  thither,  and  the  great  armies — the 
fierce-riding  Mongols  of  Kubla  Khan,  the  proud  ranks 
of  the  Manchus,  and  that  other  procession  when  the 
Union  Jack  and  Old  Glory  and  the  tricolour  of  France 
and  many  another  marched  side  by  side  to  save  the  white 
men  in  Peking  from  the  Boxers.  Then  I  looked  around 
on  this  little  crew  of  which  I  had  constituted  myself  the 
escort.  Surely  no  stranger  caravan  had  ever  knocked  at 
the  gates  of  Kubla  Khan. 

It  was  growing  dark  now,  and  the  children  were 
hungry.  We  fished  out  the  remnants  of  some  very 
dry  sandwiches,  and  some  sweet  chocolate.  They  ate  it 


120  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

all  ravenously.  Obviously  this  was  not  enough,  for  sud- 
denly Little  Mum  exclaimed:  "Where  is  Bobby?"  Once 
more  I  started  in  pursuit.  I  found  Bobby  in  the  Chinese 
carriage,  hospitably  sharing  rice  and  duck's  eggs  with 
half  a  dozen  delighted  Orientals.  I  rescued  him  and 
bore  him  back,  protesting  loudly,  just  in  time  to  discover 
Nora  on  the  platform  swinging  against  the  gate  that 
separated  her  from  the  dark  and  flying  earth  below. 
I  carried  them  both  back  and  deposited  them  behind  a 
barricade  of  baggage. 

Little  Mum,  utterly  worn  out,  had  fallen  asleep  in 
my  absence  with  her  baby  asleep  at  her  breast,  and  little 
Karin  cuddling  at  her  side  somewhere  between  dreams 
and  waking.  Bobby  and  Nora  were  sleepy  now,  and  very 
cross. 

In  a  low  voice  I  offered  to  tell  them  stories.  Appar- 
ently no  one  had  ever  told  them  stories  before,  and  they 
could  see  no  charm  in  the  performance.  I  tried  to  pet 
them,  but  they  were  restless  and  suspicious,  like  little 
wild  creatures,  willing  to  be  friends  only  when  the  initi- 
ative was  left  to  them.  Nevertheless  the  night  and  the 
shadows  thrown  by  the  dim  light  of  the  smoky  kerosene 
lamp,  our  only  illumination,  frightened  them  a  little, 
and  in  their  own  savage  fashion  they  clung  to  me. 

But  even  bad  little  children  must  sleep  sometimes. 
Slowly  their  lids  began  to  droop,  though  they  were 
perversely  determined  to  stay  awake  as  long  as  possible. 
Finally  Bobby,  snuggling  close — not  in  friendliness,  but 
in  a  kind  of  fear — dropped  his  little  head  against  my  lap. 
I  removed  his  shoes  and  loosened  his  garments  a  little. 
Thereupon  Nora,  jealous  of  these  attentions,  dumped 
herself  down  with  some  emphasis  on  the  other  side  of 
me  and  went  to  sleep  at  once. 


121 

So  they  all  slept,  and  only  I  was  awake  through  hours 
on  end,  as  the  train  crept  slowly  on  through  the  dark- 
ness to  Peking.  All  through  the  train  the  Chinese  were 
sleeping  now.  Gradually  the  light  burned  dimmer  and 
dimmer.  An  old  Chinese  would  enter  now  and  again 
and  deposit  a  pot  of  tea. 

Some  time  after  two  we  pulled  into  Peking.  I  half 
expected  that  the  friends  to  whom  I  had  been  consigned 
there  would  meet  me.  But  I  had  no  time  to  look  out  for 
myself.  Carrying  Karin  on  one  arm,  securely  seizing 
Nora  by  the  other  hand,  and  admonishing  Bobby  to 
cling  to  Nora,  I  got  off  the  train.  I  discovered  afterward 
that  a  man  had  been  sent  to  meet  me,  but  he  had  gone 
away,  reporting  that  no  one  had  come  except  a  woman 
with  a  tiny  babe  and  the  mother  of  three  children.  So 
I  forfeited  my  escort.  But  this  was  of  no  interest  to  me 
at  the  time.  The  question  now  was  what  to  do. 

Knowing  the  ways  of  Oriental  cities  by  this  time,  I 
thought  there  must  surely  be  a  good  foreign  hotel  in 
Peking.  I  asked  the  name  of  it  from  the  most  re- 
sponsible-looking official  about  the  station,  and  was  di- 
rected to  the  Wagon-lits.  I  even  found  a  man  of  the 
hotel  who  spoke  a  little  English  and  was  there  to  get 
belated  baggage  that  missed  the  express.  A  taxi  was  not 
procurable,  he  said.  Would  we  take  rickshaws? 
Obviously  we  should  have  to. 

We  loaded  Little  Mum's  twelve  pieces  of  baggage  and 
my  eight,  including  my  camera  and  typewriter,  on  a  suc- 
cession of  rickshaws.  Now,  a  rickshaw  is  made  only  for 
one  person,  but  obviously  we  could  not  trust  the  chil- 
dren to  strange  coolies.  So  in  one  I  put  Little  Mum, 
with  Bobby,  who  was,  I  thought,  the  most  responsible 
of  the  children,  despite  his  predilection  for  Chinese  so- 


122  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

ciety.  Then  I  got  into  another  rickshaw,  took  Karin 
and  Nora  on  my  lap,  and  directed  the  coolie  to  bear  us 
away. 

The  night  was  still  and  starlit,  and  sweet  at  this  hour 
with  dew  and  summer  scents.  A  row  of  the  electric 
lights  blinked  sleepily  before  me,  and  turned  the  leaves 
of  trees  here  and  there  to  silver  and  transparency.  Be- 
yond rose  the  outlines  of  a  wall,  massive  and  sombre, 
a  fortress  of  shadows  challenging  the  very  stars — the 
wall  of  Kubla  Khan.  The  children  slept  in  my  arms 
and  against  my  side,  and  I  prayed  that  that  ragged 
celestial  on  whom  our  life  now  seemed  to  depend  was  a 
trusty  soul  and  would  bear  us  safe.  So  it  was  that  I 
entered  into  the  city  of  the  old  emperors. 

Soon  we  drew  up  before  the  hotel.  Leading  in  my 
five  babes  in  the  woods,  I  registered  for  us  all. 

Then  it  was  that  my  troubles  really  began.  As  I  stood 
there,  myself  heavy  with  sleep,  weighted  down  with 
Karin  in  my  arms,  clutching  the  dream  of  a  soft  white 
bed  and  the  clarity  of  morning  beyond  it  for  the  solu- 
tion of  all  problems,  Little  Mum  announced  that  she 
must  find  her  husband  at  once. 

"He  must  be  in  Peking,"  she  said.  "Surely,  if  he  is 
in  Peking,  we  can  find  him.  Some  one  must  find  him." 

In  vain  I  remonstrated.  I  spoke  lyrically  of  the  com- 
forts of  bed,  hopefully  of  the  light  of  the  morning, 
tenderly  of  the  children  who  must  have  sleep.  I  did  not 
think  of  what  was  probably  her  reason  for  concern, 
the  fear  of  running  up  a  hotel  bill  which  she  could  not 
pay.  I  was  quite  ready  to  share  my  own  scanty  funds 
for  the  sake  of  peace  in  the  family  and  dreams  till  dawn. 

She  persisted.  She  went  from  one  bland  Chinese  clerk 
to  another,  pleading :  Where  was  her  husband?  Could 
not  they  find  her  husband?  She  awoke  half  a  dozen 


THE  EESCUE  OF  LITTLE  MUM  123 

sleeping  Chinese  boys  and  repeated  the  plea.  She  was 
obdurate  with  the  obduracy  of  a  child.  Plainly  there 
was  to  be  no  sleep  in  that  hotel  till  her  husband  was 
found. 

The  children,  subdued  by  night  and  fear,  now  clung 
to  me  helplessly,  pathetically.  Resolutely  I  announced 
that,  whatever  she  did,  I  intended  to  take  the  children 
upstairs  and  put  them  to  sleep.  Suddenly  she  noticed 
a  light  in  one  of  the  side  rooms. 

"Why,"  she  said  naively,  "there  are  people  there! 
There  are  white  men.  Perhaps  they  know  my  husband." 

A  party  in  evening  dress  was  gathered  around  some 
card  tables.  There  were  piles  of  money  on  the  tables 
and  glasses  of  whiskey  and  soda  before  each  player. 

"Speak  to  them,"  pleaded  Little  Mum,  laying  her  hand 
on  my  arm  coaxingly.  "Please,  I  beg  you  to  speak  to 
them  and  ask  them  where  is  my  husband." 

It  seemed  unlikely  that  a  group  like  that  would  know 
of  a  Dane,  apparently  in  moderate  circumstances  and 
but  newly  come  to  town.  Besides,  I  was  a  little  in  doubt 
concerning  the  character  of  the  women,  or  the  state  of 
any  one's  wits  after  all  night  consumption  of  whiskey 
and  soda.  I  did  not  want  her  to  be  teased  or  shocked, 
or  even  snubbed  by  that  gay  party. 

I  tried  to  communicate  my  suspicions  to  her,  but  she 
did  not  understand.  There  were  white  men  there,  and 
white  men  were  her  natural  protectors.  My  services,  in 
her  eyes,  were  now  superfluous.  Like  all  women  of  her 
type,  she  had  an  almost  unbounded  trust  in  a  man,  any 
man,  and  a  subtle  distrust  of  a  woman  as  guide  and 
guardian. 

Fluttering  around  like  a  pretty  bird,  she  detached 
the  children  from  me  and,  with  tender  cooings,  shep- 
herded them  before  her  into  the  doorway  of  that  room, 


124  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

and  stood  there  with  her  little  blonde  children  at  her 
feet,  and  her  wee  baby  in  her  arms. 

"Pardon  me,"  she  said  in  her  plaintive  voice,  "but 
surely  you  must  know  my  husband." 

A  strange  vision  she  was,  this  little  doll  thing  and 
her  doll  children,  bursting  upon  the  hectic  and  swim- 
ming consciousness  of  such  a  midnight  group.  A  man 
stared  vaguely  at  her  through  a  monocle.  A  woman 
tittered  in  embarrassment  and  constraint.  But  one  man 
rose  and  came  toward  her,  asking  with  the  utmost 
courtesy,  "What  is  your  husband's  name?" 

She  gave  it,  adding  that  he  worked  for  a  Danish  firm. 

"It  must  be  the firm,"  he  said. 

"It  is  like  that,"  she  assented  eagerly,  and,  turning  to 
the  rest  of  the  group,  he  said,  with  an  air  that  silenced 
at  once  the  laughter  tittering  on  the  lips  of  the  woman, 
"Does  any  one  know of  the firm?" 

The  man  with  the  monocle  arose,  apparently  not  half 
so  rude  as  he  looked,  and  came  forward,  suggesting 
that  they  telephone  to  some  one  else  in  the  firm. 

"Yes,  I  know  two  or  three  people  there,"  said  Little 
Mum's  self-constituted  champion.  "If  you  will  just 
make  the  lady  comfortable" — and  precipitating  her  upon 
the  man  with  a  monocle,  who  was  now  all  courtesy,  he 
was  off  to  the  telephone.  The  children  meanwhile  fled 
back  to  me. 

In  a  few  minutes,  Little  Mum  floated  over  to  me,  gay 
as  a  butterfly. 

"They  have  found  him,"  she  cried.  "He  is  coming  for 
me  at  once." 

My  responsibilities  were  now  at  an  end.  I  delivered 
my  little  sleepy  charges.  But  they  who  had  been  such 
wild  little  things,  suspicious  and  adverse  to  petting,  now 


THE  KESCUE  OP  LITTLE  MUM  125 

clung  to  me,  unwilling  to  be  taken  away,  and  I  was  a 
little  sorry  to  release  them. 

I  never  saw  Little  Mum  after  that  night.  My  last 
glimpse  of  her  was  a  touching  tableau.  Coming  back 
downstairs,  to  separate  my  baggage  from  hers,  I  found 
her  enthroned  in  an  easy  chair,  blushing  and  sparkling 
as  she  had  never  sparkled  in  my  presence,  while  my  mas- 
culine successor  to  this  domestic  regency  marched  up 
and  down  with  Bobby  on  his  shoulder;  and  the  game 
of  cards  went  on  in  the  other  room  without  him.  And 
without  the  monocle  of  his  superior  friend,  too,  for  that 
was  now  adorning  Bobby's  right  eye. 

So  Little  Mum  vanished  from  the  scene,  and  into  the 
arms  of  her  husband,  I  hope,  but  the  Don  Quixote  who 
at  last  restored  her  missing  lord  became  the  hero  of 
another  story  which  I  will  tell  anon. 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE  COURTS  OF  KUBLA  KHAN 

NOTHING  that  I  had  seen  in  any  other  city  of  China  ex- 
plained Peking.  There  were  wide  streets,  enormously 
wide,  where  the  feet  of  the  coolies  pluffed  softly  in  deep 
dust.  They  were  crowded  with  strange  throngs  that  had 
no  parallel  in  the  cities  of  China — Mongols  and  Thibe- 
tans in  woolen  draperies,  and  Lama  novices  in  robes  the 
colour  of  grape- juice.  Women  in  flowing  dresses  walked 
by  twos  and  threes  with  unbound  feet  on  shoes  set  three 
or  four  inches  above  the  earth.  They  had  great  head- 
dresses like  wings.  Their  long  faces  were  gaily  rouged 
and  their  eyebrows  stained  in  pencilled  lines  of  black. 
These  were  Manchu  ladies,  of  the  race  which  has  ruled 
China  for  three  centuries.  Very  white  they  were,  these 
Manchu  women,  and  strangely  alluring,  with  the  sleek 
air  of  harem  creatures,  and  a  kind  of  desert  shyness. 
Among  the  human  throngs  moved  vehicles  and  animals 
which  I  had  not  seen  in  any  Chinese  city — hooded  carts 
with  clumsy  wheels,  funny  little  horses,  and  ever  and 
anon  a  camel-caravan. 

For  Peking  is  not  properly  a  Chinese  city.  It  is  the 
quintessence  of  the  pomp  and  power  latent  in  savage 
places  and  desert  peoples — Tartar  and  Mongol  and  Man- 
chu— called  into  being  by  fertile  contact  with  the  civili- 
zation of  China.  Always  a  foreign  capital,  Peking  had 
taken  unto  itself  the  civilization  of  China  and  placed  it 
sometimes  in  alien  frames,  building  up  a  city  that  was 
not  wholly  of  China,  nor  yet  of  Thibet  or  Mongolia  or 

126 


THE  COURTS  OF  KUBLA  KHAN     127 

Tartary,  but  the  consummation  of  the  genius  of  all  the 
Mongolian  peoples. 

Then  gradually,  as  I  rode  in  the  dry  sunshine  of  early 
summer,  its  form  became  clear  to  me.  It  is  not  one  city, 
but  rather  a  series  of  concentric  cities,  wall  within 
wall,  holding  at  its  heart  the  forbidden  palaces.  Around 
the  Forbidden  City  is  the  Imperial  City,  and  between 
that  and  the  great  Tartar  wall  is  the  Tartar  City,  a  por- 
tion of  which  is  now  laid  out  like  a  European  capital 
with  fine  avenues  of  shade  trees  and  lawns.  Here  the 
legations  are  housed,  and  guarded  by  their  own  soldiers. 
Outside  this  is  the  wall  of  Kubla  Khan,  pierced  by  mag- 
nificent gates  that  are,  as  it  were,  tunnels  through  it, 
and  wide  enough  on  top  to  form  the  favourite  promenade 
of  Peking  society.  Outside  of  this  lies  the  Chinese  city, 
and  beyond,  wastes  of  dust  and  casual  green,  stretch- 
ing away  to  meet  the  fairy  blue  of  the  Western  Hills. 
As  I  went  about  that  first  day,  something  of  the  age 
and  strangeness  of  it  all  came  over  me,  an  age  and  a 
strangeness  that  were  not  of  the  past,  but  still  vital  and 
living  among  the  forces  of  to-day.  One  seemed  to  have 
come  to  the  outposts  of  the  world  in  this  capital  of 
crumbling  China,  on  the  edge  of  the  vast  chaos  of  Sibe- 
rian Eussia.  Everywhere  there  were  hints  of  immeasur- 
able age,  not  indeed  in  Peking  itself,  for  that  is  scarcely 
older  than  most  European  capitals,  but  in  the  civiliza- 
tions it  enshrined.  And  yet  it  belonged  not  wholly  to 
the  times  of  long  ago.  In  the  palaces  of  the  Great  Mo- 
gul in  Northern  India,  which  are  the  only  things  in 
Asia,  perhaps  in  the  world,  which  compare  in  imperial 
magnificence  with  the  palaces  of  Peking,  I  had  always 
the  sense  of  a  civilization  dead  and  gone.  Though  their 
palaces  wore  a  freshness  as  of  yesterday,  though  it  is 
only  within  the  memory  of  man  that  the  last  vestiges 


128  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

of  their  power  were  swept  away,  one  has  no  fear  that 
those  ghosts  will  arise  and  walk  again. 

But  in  Peking,  in  the  midst  of  an  imperialism  more 
ancient,  among  splendours  that  have  come  nigher  to  the 
dust,  one  has  still  the  sense  of  perennial  life.  The  last 
great  drama  of  the  empire  is  not  yet  played  out.  It 
began  yesterday,  and  another  scene  may  be  enacted  to- 
morrow. And  among  the  ghosts  of  the  past,  figures  al- 
ready embalmed  in  books  with  the  history  of  a  dead 
rule  still  walk  about,  fresh,  young,  living.  The  Empress 
Dowager  is  dead.  Her  marble  bridges  are  stained  with 
rain  and  dust,  and  on  her  lakes  where  once  plied  the 
pleasure  boats  of  her  maidens  the  green  scum  now 
gathers  about  the  neglected  lotus-flowers.  But  her  first 
lady-in-waiting  took  tea  with  me,  like  any  American 
girl,  a  pretty  young  woman,  vivacious  and  smart,  and 
very  much  a  creature  of  these  times! 

The  terrors  of  the  Boxer  Uprising  are  among  the 
tales  our  fathers  tell.  In  the  lawns  of  the  British  lega- 
tion the  scars  of  shot  are  now  healed  with  grass  and 
lost  among  the  petals  of  flowers,  and  in  the  sunshine 
that  falls  so  quietly  among  the  princely  red  courts 
there  is  no  memory  of  smoke  and  fire.  But  Dr.  Game- 
well,  the  hero  of  that  famous  siege — without  whom 
these  white  men  and  women  locked  up  between  the 
.Boxers  and  the  Empress  Dowager  could  never  have 
survived — was  a  kindly  simple  man  in  middle  life,  with 
whom  I  used  to  talk  about  Chinese  education  and  to 
whom  I  even  carried,  on  occasion,  the  tale  of  my  trou- 
bles. Out  of  the  history  that  was  already  a  legend,  the 
heroes  and  heroines  of  a  vanished  regime  emerged  as 
living  creatures,  gossiping  of  matters  that  seem  now  to 
belong  only  to  ghosts. 

But  for  a  time  I  had  no  thought  for  the  past.    I  was 


«n     ^^ 

r  ^ 


It  seemed  scarcely  credible  that,  out  of  that  legendary  past,  a 
living  princess  could  step  into  one's  presence 


I 


A  pretty  young  woman,  vivacious  and  chic,  and  very  much  a 
creature  of  these  times 


THE  COURTS  OP  KUBLA  KHAN     12!) 

engrossed  in  the  international  whirl  of  the  present.  The 
diplomatic  life  I  found  petty  enough,  and  missionaries 
are  seldom  at  their  best  in  these  larger  centres.  To 
families  marooned  there  year  after  year  the  splen- 
dours which  are  so  alluring  to  the  visitor  have  long  since 
become  an  old  story,  and  are,  moreover,  subtly  dis- 
credited by  pride  of  race.  Hemmed  in  by  wastes  of 
sea  and  wastes  of  land,  isolated  by  the  speech  and  cus- 
toms of  an  alien  folk,  the  white  men  are  thrown  on  each 
others'  mercies.  Banding  together  to  protect  them- 
selves from  without,  they  must  also  protect  themselves 
in  the  closeness  of  this  contact  with  each  other.  So 
there  arise  cliques  and  defensive  alliances,  jealousies, 
bickerings,  and  mutual  criticism.  So,  too,  there  arise 
little  reputations  which  would,  in  the  broad  blaze  of  the 
world,  be  like  gas-flames  in  sunshine,  but  which  make 
these  small  settlements  feel  like  a  land  which  has  no 
need  of  the  sun  or  the  moon  to  enlighten  it.  More- 
over, in  a  petty  diplomatic  centre  there  are  also  mutual 
jealousies  of  race,  and  the  straining  after  form  and 
precedence  which  grace  the  larger  courts  and  capitals. 
Yet  dull  as  the  foreign  community  seemed,  both  the 
diplomatic  and  the  missionary  families  counted  among 
their  numbers  some  exotic  guests.  One  man  blew  in 
from  Harbin,  and  was  off  again  in  a  day,  but  he  set 
going  some  of  the  first  news  about  the  Bolsheviki,  then 
just  beginning  their  incredible  experiment.  In  his 
train  appeared  two  others  from  Tsingtau,  averring  that 
the  Japanese  had  no  intention  of  giving  back  Shantung 
should  the  war  ever  end,  a  statement  which  precipi- 
tated argument.  Then  came  a  prank  from  Moscow,  who 
swore  that  the  World  War  would  still  be  won  on  the 
eastern  front.  Followed  some  refugees  from  the  Cau- 
cuses, including  an  American  woman  with  a  nursing 


130 

baby.  They  had  been  with  the  American  relief,  and 
had  fled  before  the  Turks  three  weeks  after  the  baby 
was  born.  How  they  covered  the  infinities  of  lawless 
land  between  the  Caucuses  and  Peking,  unarmed  and 
without  supplies,  I  do  not  know.  But  here  they  were, 
none  the  worse — a  rosy  mother  of  a  rosy  baby.  There 
were  also  Kussian  gentlemen  and  ladies  of  some  degree 
exiled  by  the  Bolsheviki,  who  pre-empted  all  the  card 
tables  and  the  more  exotic  brands  of  alcohol  in  the  com- 
munity forthwith,  and  were  not  at  home  to  any  one  who 
could  not  speak  French. 

Indeed  every  bark  afloat  on  the  troubled  seas  of  na- 
tionality between  the  Pacific  Ocean  and  the  eastern 
bounds  of  the  German  empire  ultimately  came  into  port 
in  Peking.  Daily  we  looked  for  the  arrival  of  the  frail- 
est skiff  of  all,  and  half  expected  that  the  family  of  the 
Russian  Czar  would  enter  some  morning  into  our  midst. 

For  in  Peking,  in  the  later  days  of  the  war,  one  could 
feel  the  very  pulse  of  history.  At  that  time  it  seemed 
that  this  great  city,  so  often  the  pawn  of  conflicting 
peoples  and  imperial  hopes,  was  now  to  be  the  centre 
of  a  greater  storm,  for  all  around  there  were  threaten- 
ings  and  mutterings  as  out  of  chaos,  talk  of  the  Japa- 
nese menace  on  the  frontiers  of  China,  and  threatenings 
out  of  Siberian  Russia.  For  the  war  was  not  yet  over, 
and  every  one  was  still  privileged  to  shape  in  imagina- 
tion its  final  act.  Most  of  our  talk  is  now  out  of  date. 
Yet  the  chaos  of  Asia  remains,  the  murmurings  and  the 
mutterings,  and  the  stirring  of  new  national  lives  that 
have  not  yet  come  to  birth. 

From  the  tumults  of  the  present,  I  would  turn  to  the 
old  historic  tumults  of  the  city — to  the  Boxer  Uprising, 
and  to  the  succession  of  usurping  emperors,  who  from 
dynasty  to  dynasty  down  to  the  Empress  Dowager  her- 


THE  COURTS  OF  KUBLA  KHAN     131 

self,  had  conquered  a  throne  but  not  a  people.  The 
most  typical  of  them  all  was  the  Empress,  a  vital  aiid 
dominating  figure  in  the  only  profession,  except  acting, 
in  which  women,  in  all  ages,  have  been  able  to  challenge 
the  superiority  of  men.  The  sins  of  an  imperial  tradi- 
tion that  is  as  bloody  as  any  in  history  were  concen- 
trated in  her.  In  a  land  where  women  are  despised  and 
subdued,  she  had  raised  herself  by  wit  and  charm  and 
energy  of  will  to  a  place  above  all  masculine  claimants 
to  the  throne.  That  her  methods  were  not  those  that 
are  taught  in  Sunday  School  is  beside  the  point.  She 
was  true  to  her  tradition,  and  triumphs  in  history  by 
being  so  brilliantly  and  vitally  a  type.  Though  she 
died  in  1909,  she  is  already  a  mythical  character  in 
the  Chinese  Republic,  a  creature  to  rank  with  Cleo- 
patra, among  those  whom  time  and  legend  have  deified 
to  more  than  earthly  power.  With  her  died  the  old 
Empire  of  China,  and  the  oldest  throne  in  the  world. 
She  herself,  by  every  act,  had  sapped  the  foundations  of 
it,  though  it  had  withstood  thousands  of  years.  Yet  it  is 
doubtful  if  another  could  have  carried  on  so  long.  She 
lived  too  late,  and  lost  the  fame  of  imperial  beneficence 
by  the  caprice  of  time.  Yet  it  is  characteristic  of  her 
that  it  was  not  in  her  life-time  that  men  saw  the  final 
crumbling  of  the  dragon  throne. 

Chosen  as  royal  concubine,  she  had  made  the  most  of 
a  woman's  only  path  to  imperial  power.  For  she  had 
so  bewitched  the  Emperor  that  the  imperial  attentions 
passed  by  the  true  Consort  and  came  chiefly  to  her. 
Perhaps  as  a  natural  consequence,  she  had  borne  a  son, 
while  the  Imperial  Consort  was  still  childless.  It  took 
only  a  little  more  witchery  to  have  the  boy  declared  the 
heir  to  the  throne.  By  the  time  the  Emperor  died,  she 
had  been  raised  from  the  position  of  Favourite  Concu- 


132 

bine  to  full  partnership  with  her  rival  in  the  position 
of  wife.  The  next  step  was  to  be  declared  Regent  of 
the  Empire  jointly  with  the  true  Dowager  Empress, 
while  the  child  that  was  hers  by  nature  and  the  other 
woman's  by  grace  of  position  only  was  still  in  minority. 
Thereafter  the  other  Dowager  ceased  to  count  at  all, 
and  ultimately  removed  herself  from  the  path  of  am- 
bition by  death — a  habit  that  baby-emperors  under  her 
regency  also  developed,  as  soon  as  they  drew  too  near 
to  maturity.  There  were  not  wanting  those  who  com- 
mented on  this  strange  coincidence.  But  the  Empress 
had  so  ably  buttressed  herself  with  all  the  self-interest 
of  the  corrupt  bureaucracy  of  China,  and  was,  in  some 
respects,  so  skilful  an  executive  that  the  whisper  did  not 
rise  to  full  accusation. 

One  Emperor,  Kwangsu,  did  attain  his  majority  and 
his  throne,  and  the  Empress,  now  no  longer  young,  re- 
tired in  his  favour,  with  the  fine  gesture  of  self-sacri- 
fice, and  went  to  live  in  the  Summer  Palace  where  she 
could  watch  the  developments  as  a  mere  private  gentle- 
woman who  seeks  no  honour  save  that  of  motherhood. 
The  Emperor  was  a  good  young  man  who,  even  in  the 
seclusion  in  which  the  Empress  had  kept  him,  had  not 
failed  to  feel  the  new  currents  of  thought  that  had 
swept  Japan  into  the  arena  of  world  progress.  When 
he  came  to  the  throne,  he  promptly  formulated  a  series 
of  edicts,  designed  to  modernize  China  over  night.  Had 
he  succeeded,  the  world  would  have  seen  something  be- 
side which  the  rise  of  Japan  would  have  served  only  for 
tea-cup  gossip  among  nations,  something  which  would 
have  altered  the  course  of  history,  and  changed  even 
the  character  and  proportions  of  the  World  War.  Had 
there  been  a  Shogun  as  able  as  the  Empress,  the  history 
of  Japan  might  have  been  otherwise.  However  this 


THE  COURTS  OF  KUBLA  KHAN     133 

may  be,  the  good  offices  of  Kwangsu  were  doomed.  It 
was  not  in  the  power  of  an  average  young  man,  inex- 
perienced in  a  world  which  the  Empress  had  moulded 
and  held  bound  to  her  by  every  tie  of  life,  to  accomplish 
anything  against  her  will.  On  a  great  tide  of  reaction 
she  was  swept  back  to  power,  "to  save  the  Empire,"  and 
reigned  undisputed  till  her  death,  with  the  young  Em- 
peror safely  gaoled  in  her  palace. 

One  result  was  the  Boxer  Uprising,  the  Empress' 
flight,  and  the  looting  even  of  the  inviolable  treasures  of 
the  Forbidden  City  by  the  avenging  nations  of  the  West. 
Another  was  the  further  humiliation  of  China  in  the 
scramble  of  foreign  powers  for  concessions,  and  a  series 
of  diplomatic  dealings  on  her  part  at  once  dastardly 
and  inept.  The  average  monarch  could  not  have 
survived  a  tithe  of  these  mistakes.  Yet  she  lived  and 
reigned  against  the  wrath  of  the  whole  civilized  world, 
fresh  and  charming  in  her  old  age  as  Bernhardt  herself, 
and  died  at  last,  neither  by  the  hand  of  the  assassin 
nor  the  executioner,  but  securely  and  at  peace,  saving 
face  even  in  the  presence  of  death.  Two  years  after- 
wards China  was  a  Republic. 

It  seemed  a  marvellous  life  to  me,  and  I  longed  to 
know  it  more  intimately.  But  who  could  reveal  the  true 
inwardness  of  those  days  in  the  Forbidden  City,  scarcely 
a  decade  before,  which  were  already  legendary,  shrouded 
in  myth  and  alien  custom? 

But  one  day,  in  a  bookstore,  I  came  upon  a  volume 
entitled  Two  Years  in  the  Forbidden  City  by  Princess 
Der  Ling,  First  Lady  in  Waiting  to  the  Empress  Dow- 
ager. She  wrote  delightful  English,  this  Manchu 
princess,  fresh  as  the  chatter  of  any  merry  girl,  and 
her  words  were  a  magical  key  to  that  old  royal  life.  Tri- 
umphantly I  bore  the  book  homeward.  Then  a  pretty 


134 

little  missionary  wife  who  had  been  very  kind  to  me, 
said,  "Would  you  like  to  meet  Princess  Der  Ling?  She 
married  an  American,  and  we  all  know  her  well." 

It  seemed  scarcely  credible  that,  out  of  that  dusty 
past,  a  living  figure  could  step  into  one's  own  presence. 
Yet  so  it  was.  Princess  Der  Ling  was  an  attractive 
young  woman,  chic  and  sprightly  and  smartly  gowned, 
with  heavy  black  hair  and  clear  white  skin,  and  slightly 
flattened  features  that  told  rather  of  Tartary  than 
China.  She  spoke  English  fluently,  with  only  a  slight 
accent  that  might  have  been  French,  and  a  delightful 
interlarding  of  American  slang.  A  woman  of  energy, 
intelligence,  and  a  cosmopolitan  experience  which  is 
granted  to  few,  she  had  carved  out  her  life  between 
three  civilizations,  and  was  still  fighting  for  her  right 
to  be  not  wholly  Manchu,  nor  yet  American  or  French, 
but  just  herself. 

She  was  born  the  daughter  of  Lord  Yuen,  the  Minis- 
ter to  France  under  the  Empress  Dowager.  It  was  the 
custom  to  register  the  daughters  of  officials  at  the  pal- 
ace, that  the  Emperor  might  choose  them  for  secondary 
wives  if  he  wished.  It  was  thus  that  the  Empress 
Dowager  had  entered  upon  her  path  to  power.  But 
Lord  Yuen,  having  other  plans  for  his  daughters, 
spirited  them  away  to  Europe,  and  brought  them  up  as 
French  girls.  After  they  had  reached  young  ladyhood 
and  were  enjoying  the  full  whirl  of  belledom  in  Paris, 
the  old  Empress  heard  of  them,  and  summoned  them  to 
her  court.  How  they  came,  and  were  chosen  her  ladies 
in  waiting,  and  all  the  trials  and  tribulations  of  their 
adjustment  to  a  life  quite  alien  to  their  customs  if  not 
to  their  birth,  Princess  Der  Ling  herself  has  told. 

In  the  palace  Der  Ling's  shrewdness,  integrity,  and 
girlish  good  humour,  and  especially  her  value  as  a  means 


THE  COURTS  OF  KUBLA  KHAN     135 

of  information  of  the  outside  world  which  the  Empress 
could  tap  without  losing  face,  soon  made  her  a  favourite, 
and  she  was  made  first  lady  in  waiting  and  given  the 
title  of  Princess  in  her  own  right.  She  had  the  incom- 
parable advantage  of  seeing  the  life  of  the  imperial 
court  in  its  last  days,  of  knowing  one  of  the  great  em- 
presses of  the  world  in  the  intimacy  of  her  boudoir. 
And  she  had  seen  her  thus  intimately  as  one  of  us 
might  see  her,  in  the  perspective  of  Europe  and  the  West. 

With  her  I  wandered  through  the  museum  of  the  For- 
bidden City,  among  porcelains  that  gleamed  like  pre- 
cious jewels,  carvings  of  jade,  and  red  lacquer  wrought 
as  if  by  the  tools  of  elves,  and  embroideries  of  marvellous 
intricacy  and  exactitude.  Looking  over  the  sweep  of 
golden  roofs  of  yellow  porcelain  tiles  fantastically 
curled  above  the  eaves,  she  said  that  she  had  never  loved 
the  Forbidden  City.  Even  in  her  time  it  had  seemed  old 
and  desolate,  full  of  locked  chambers  and  haunted  pas- 
sageways, so  that  one  scarcely  dared  venture  out  of  the 
beaten  paths.  Even  the  old  Empress  did  not  like  to  stay 
there.  She  liked  the  summer  palace  better. 

But  Princess  Der  Ling  assured  me  that  the  life 
with  the  old  Empress  had  not  been  unhappy.  There 
were,  of  course,  minor  and  unpleasant  excitements,  when 
the  old  lady  had  a  tantrum  or  the  eunuchs  must  be 
flogged.  There  was  a  continual  tale-bearing  among  the 
court  ladies  and  plotting  among  the  eunuchs.  And  her 
heart  was  always  sad  for  the  pensive  young  emperor  who 
lived  a  prisoner  beneath  his  "mother's"  eye,  lest  he 
should  find  some  way  of  making  China  a  more  modern 
state,  or  disturbing  some  bloodstained  and  outworn  tra- 
dition. 

But,  though  she  was  often  weary  with  standing  and 
dizzy  with  kowtowing,  there  was  much  that  was  de- 


136 

lightful  in  that  life.  The  old  Empress  was  fascinating, 
even  in  those  her  last  clays,  and  had  a  motherly  way 
with  her  favourites.  It  was  a  pleasant  womanly  pic- 
ture she  drew  of  the  winsome,  unscrupulous  old  auto- 
crat, with  her  gusts  of  love  and  tenderness,  her  delight 
in  fine  clothes  and  picnics  and  games,  her  dark  secrets, 
her  whims  and  naivete',  and  her  sentimental  moods  of 
piety,  when  everybody  in  the  palace  must  think  of  his 
sins  and  burn  candles  to  Buddha.  Though  the  days  were 
made  up  mostly  of  an  endless  laying  out  of  jewels  and 
fine  garments,  and  interminable  meals  which  her  ladies 
must  eat  standing  in  her  presence,  there  was  also  a  good 
deal  of  pure  girlish  fun,  goings  to  and  fro  between  the 
palaces,  picnics  and  excursions  on  the  lake,  birthdays 
and  feast-days,  and  ever  and  anon  the  appearance  of 
gorgeous  presents.  Through  it  all  Princess  Der  Ling 
had  certain  minor  troubles  all  her  own,  growing  out  of 
the  fact  that  she  was  less  a  Manchu  in  breeding  than  in 
birth.  For  the  old  Empress  would  make  her  pray  to 
Buddha,  and  was  determined  to  marry  her  to  a  prince 
of  her  own  choosing,  and  she  was  hard  put  to  it  at  times 
to  escape  a  husband. 

"She  was  charming,"  she  said  of  the  old  Empress. 
"She  could  make  you  love  and  hate  her  by  turn,  but  of 
course  she  was  odd.  All  crowned  heads  are  eccen- 
tric. I  was  presented  at  various  European  courts,  and 
I  never  saw  a  king  or  queen  or  prince  of  high  degree  that 
wasn't  a  little  queer.  It's  bound  to  be  so.  They  live 
such  abnormal  lives."  So  she  talked,  and  I  marvelled 
at  her,  as  at  one  returned  from  the  dead. 

The  strangeness  of  the  fact  that  a  girl  so  fresh  and 
young  should  speak  as  a  contemporary  of  imperialism 
so  lengendary  came  to  me  again  when  I  was  admitted  to 
the  Forbidden  City  itself.  Forbidden  it  is,  even  to  this 


THE  COURTS  OF  KUBLA  KHAN  137 

day — a  sombre  and  desolate  place,  but  full  of  a  kind 
of  dusty  dignity — not  so  fresh  as  the  summer  palace, 
not  so  pretty  and  graceful  and  open,  blanketed  in  the 
shadow  of  trees,  and  a  prey  to  grasses  and  wild  crea- 
tures. It  was  lonely  with  the  loneliness  of  a  great  empty 
hall,  with  such  loneliness  as  belongs  only  to  spots  where 
human  beings  have  once  lived,  desolate,  full  of  vague 
presences  and  inarticulate  memories  of  death.  I  walked 
along  the  beautiful  avenues,  fearfully,  as  if  they  were 
empty  corridors  and  the  sound  of  my  own  footsteps 
might  echo  in  the  dust.  The  grass  was  all  unshaven  and 
forlorn,  and  the  lake  a  little  shabby,  for  the  dead  leaves 
clung  about  the  lotus  flowers,  and  there  was  on  the  sur- 
face a  kind  of  dust  or  scum,  as  if  no  living  thing  had 
cared  to  frolic  in  the  waters. 

I  followed  trails  among  the  great  rocks  and  through 
the  groves,  and  peeped  into  halls  where  gold  and  ver- 
milion gleamed  wanly  through  dust.  Many  of  the  build- 
ings were  ruined  and  falling  into  decay.  The  mythical 
beasts  that  stood  in  a  fixed  parade  upon  their  curled 
roofs  were  strangled  among  grasses.  Even  Buddha  had 
not  been  spared  the  universal  oblivion.  I  came  to  a  mar- 
vellous structure  in  his  honour  built  of  yellow  porcelain 
bricks,  on  each  of  which  there  was  a  bas-relief  of  Bud- 
dha, hundreds  and  hundreds  of  Buddhas,  moulded  in 
imperial  yellow.  But  brick  was  falling  away  from  brick, 
and  more  than  one  Buddha  lay  face  downward,  bat- 
tered, in  the  dust.  Sometimes  I  stirred  a  wild  bird, 
which  flew  cheeping  among  the  bushes ;  but,  for  the  most 
part,  the  presence  that  enters  in  and  inhabits  lonely 
places  had  made  of  these  parks  its  dwelling-place  and 
laid  its  oppression  upon  their  peace. 

Yet  for  all  the  youth  of  the  figures  who  were  part  of 
the  old  tradition,  for  all  the  stir  of  the  present,  the  cen- 


138  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

tring  here  of  so  much  of  the  wild  formless  life  of  North- 
ern Asia,  there  is  in  imperial  Peking  the  solemnity  of 
death.  It  is  a  deeper  solemnity  than  that  which  dwells 
about  the  palaces  and  temples  of  Northern  India,  for  it 
expresses  an  older  tradition  and  a  more  persistent  life. 
The  test  of  a  civilization,  as  of  a  personality,  is  its 
grandeur  in  decay.  Things  ephemeral  or  careless  or 
inharmoniously  conceived  crumble  and  grow  shabby. 
But  a  civilization  nobly  conceived  and  honestly  built 
and  rooted  deep  in  the  verities  of  life  seems  to  grow 
more  beautiful  as  the  transient  prettiness  of  its  gala 
times  fall  way,  and  all  that  remains  takes  on  the  sombre 
immortality  of  indefinite  survival.  And  in  this  there  is 
hope  of  yet  another  spring. 


BOOK  THREE 


CHAPTER  XVI 

THE  CHAPERONAGE  OF  JACOB  WANG 

EVEN  more  impressive  than  the  Forbidden  City  in  its 
abandonment  is  the  great  Altar  of  Heaven.  Here,  in  the 
old  days,  the  Emperor  used  to  give  sacrifice  to  Heaven 
for  his  people,  remembering  a  power  and  a  worship 
which  outdated  Buddha  and  the  newer  gods.  Even  in 
the  time  of  Confucius  the  altar  was  immemorially  an- 
cient, and  no  one  could  tell  who  first  designed  its  white 
terraces,  nor  what  faith  went  into  the  sculpturing.  Yet, 
for  all  the  more  positive  and  triumphant  glory  of  temple 
and  cathedral  which  humanity  has  builded  since,  there 
remains  something  singularly  impressive  in  this  great 
agnostic  altar  beneath  the  open  sky.  The  thoughts  of  the 
men  who  fashioned  it  have  perished,  but  this,  the  prod- 
uct of  their  hands,  has  outsoared  all  sects  and  bigotry 
and  partial  knowledge  and  has  emerged  purified  by  time. 
Whatever  face  the  secret  beyond  our  mortal  science 
may  wear  to  a  man,  it  seems  that  he  could  feel  this  a 
noble  thing — this  great  marble  space,  open  to  the  sky, 
reared  to  the  honour  of  Heaven,  to  a  spirit  that  was  felt 
to  be  above  all  gods  and  Buddhas  and  demons  of  wind 
and  waters,  to  something  that  moves  behind  the  flight  of 
the  clouds  and  the  stately  march  of  the  stars,  something 
that  dwells  deeper  than  the  deepest  blue  of  heaven  at 
noonday,  and  shines  invisible  behind  the  transparency 
of  dawn.  The  dust  has  shrouded  Buddha  in  the  old 
scarlet  temples  and  about  the  imperial  shrines  of  Con- 

141 


142  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

fucius  the  grasses  have  grown  thick;  but  the  Altar  of 
Heaven  still  stands  in  undiminished  dignity,  consecrated 
to  a  kind  of  immortality  by  snow  and  rain  and  starshine 
and  the  winds  and  diurnal  radiances  of  the  sky. 

I  count  it  a  tribute  to  its  peculiar  quality  that  I  felt 
the  grandeur  of  this  great  structure,  for  I  saw  it  under 
auspices  which  were  far  from  solemn.  I  had  accepted 
the  escort  of  the  Diplomat.  The  Diplomat  was  the  Eng- 
lishman who  had  so  courteously  assisted  Little  Mum 
that  first  evening.  For  this  kindness,  I  cherished  faith 
in  him ;  he  had  shown  himself,  I  thought,  beyond  dispute, 
a  gentleman.  For  the  rest,  he  was  an  airy  soul,  whose 
spirit  danced  like  sunlight  in  running  water,  a  man  of 
infinite  resource  and  sagacity  in  the  handling  of  ladies. 
He  constituted  himself  my  escort,  without  introduction 
or  invitation;  but  he  made  himself,  from  the  first,  as 
welcome  as  a  summer  breeze. 

He  had  a  ceaseless  flow  of  compliment,  which  he  in- 
serted parenthetically  in  other  discourse.  Into  such  a 
parenthesis  he  slipped  without  warning,  and  was  out 
again  and  sliding  merrily  down  the  safe  highways  of 
speech  before  the  most  fastidious  lady  could  object.  He 
would  tell  you  that  Japan  could  never  fight  America 
(indeed,  America  could  win  in  any  war  with  such  girls 
to  inspire  her  boys)  and  the  talk  of  Japanese  statesmen 
was  mostly  pose  (which  reminded  him  that  one  of  the 
lovely  things  about  you  was  your  utter  lack  of  pose, 
your  sweet  honesty).  The  Japanese,  like  other  Orien- 
tals, had  no  sentiment  (nor  some  ladies  he  could  men- 
tion, either.  Their  hearts  were  ivory),  though  Japanese 
girls  were  rather  sweet  little  things  (but  not  as  attrac- 
tive as  American  girls — oh,  no!  It  took  blue  eyes  and 
sunlit  hair  to  dazzle  a  man).  And  so  on  indefinitely. 

Most  of  his  remarks  were  not  quite  so  obvious.    But 


this  was  the  formula,  applied  with  dash  or  ingenuity, 
with  intimacy  or  tenderness,  in  accordance  with  the 
lady  he  was  at  the  moment  engaged  in  adoring.  And  he 
was  so  light-hearted,  withal,  and  so  generous  that  she 
must  be  a  prig  and  a  prude  who  would  resent  this 
pretty  offering  at  her  shrine  of  the  flowers  of  speech. 

It  was  this  merry  soul  who  chose  to  show  me  the  Al- 
tar of  Heaven.  As  a  means  to  that  end  he  produced  an 
automobile  and  a  Chinese  guide,  a  portly  Oriental  with 
the  manners  of  a  benevolent  deacon.  His  name  was 
Jacob  Wang.  Who  christened  him  I  cannot  tell,  but 
Jacob  he  was,  and  Jake  for  short.  The  Diplomat  treated 
him  with  airy  familiarity  as  a  friend  and  a  brother, 
and  Jake  followed  the  Diplomat  with  the  steady  illumi- 
nation of  a  smile  that  had  a  kind  of  metallic  gleam,  as 
if  Ms  yellow  face  were  made  of  brass.  So  Jacob  Wang, 
the  Diplomat,  and  I  set  out  to  see  the  Altar  of  Heaven. 
Jacob  was  a  kind  of  concession  to  propriety  on  the  Dip- 
lomat's part.  He  had  brought  him,  I  think,  in  lieu  of 
a  chaperon.  If  this  was  Jacob's  own  conception  of  his 
duties,  he  certainly  performed  them  efficiently. 

The  sun  was  setting  when  we  rode  down  the  dusty, 
deserted  avenue  of  trees,  and  leaving  the  car,  walked 
toward  the  gleam  of  white  marble.  There  stood  the 
beautiful  thing,  circle  above  circle  of  white  steps  as- 
cending to  an  open  marble  space,  exquisitely  carved  and 
fashioned.  Nothing  more,  neither  joss-sticks  nor  in- 
cense nor  candles,  nor  image  of  any  sacred  thing.  The 
sunset  coloured  the  marble  with  faint  gleams  of  rose 
and  mauve  and  gold,  like  the  tints  on  the  white  petals 
of  hepaticas  in  the  spring;  and  above,  over  the  altar, 
the  scarlet  clouds  swept  away  in  a  procession  of  flame 
and  fire.  Beautiful  it  was,  perfectly  conceived  and 
fashioned,  and  the  more  beautiful  at  that  moment  for 


144  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

the  accidental  painting  of  light.  But  the  Diplomat 
had  seen  it  before  and  was  not  to  be  subdued  to  rev- 
erence. 

"Emperor  come  once  every  year,"  explained  Jacob. 
"Worship  here,  kneel  so."  And  he  made  a  show  of 
prostration. 

"Empress  too?"  asked  the  Diplomat.  "Empress  and 
pretty  ladies  all  in  pretty  dresses?" 

"No,  no,"  said  Jacob.    "No  empress,  no  ladies." 

"What,"  said  the  Diplomat.  "No  ladies?  Didn't  the 
ladies  care  for  Heaven?" 

Jacob  was  inarticulate. 

"Oh,  I  see,"  said  the  Diplomat,  "Heaven  did  not  like 
the  ladies." 

"No,"  said  Jacob.    "Heaven  no  like  ladies." 

"The  more  fool  Heaven,  don't  you  think,  old  chap?" 

But  the  Diplomat  did  not  go  motoring  with  a  lady 
for  the  purpose  of  holding  a  conversation  with  Jacob. 
"He  sticks  too  tight,"  he  whispered  to  me.  "Let's  shake 
him."  We  entered  the  beautiful  Winter  Temple,  a  vast 
circular  hall  carved  and  painted  in  blue  and  vermilion, 
as  if  the  whole  interior  were  of  stained  glass. 

"It  is  wonderful  that  colouring  so  vivid,  so  lavish, 
should  have  nothing  of  barbarism  about  it,"  I  remarked. 
"It  has  even  a  kind  of  sobriety  in  its  grandeur." 

"Yes,"  he  answered  absently,  looking  around  for 
Jacob. 

Jacob  was  not  in  sight.  The  Diplomat  was  not  one  to 
miss  an  opportunity  like  this.  Gently  his  hand  closed 
over  mine. 

Immediately  a  voice  said  blandly:  "Missy  no  like 
Winter  Temple.  Missy  will  come  see  Temple  of  Agri- 
culture." And  there  stood  Jacob,  his  small  glittering 
eyes  fixed  upon  the  surreptitious  hand. 


The  Temple  of  Heaven,  Peking 
Hoang  Lu  Gate,  Temple  'of  Confucius,  Peking 


A  suburb  of  Seoul,  City  Gate  in  distance 
Korean  Court  dancing  girl  and  servant 
Typical  old  Korean  swell 


THE  CHAPEKONAGE  OF  JACOB  WANG       145 

"Jacob,"  said  the  Diplomat,  trying  not  to  look  guilty, 
"don't  you  think  you  ought  to  watch  the  car?" 

"No,  master,"  said  Jacob  blandly. 

"We  don't  really  need  you  now,  Jacob." 

"Missy  will  see  Temple  of  Agriculture?"  persisted 
Jacob. 

"Well,  lead  on,  old  boy,"  said  the  Diplomat  with  an 
air  of  resignation. 

We  walked  down  another  avenue  of  bushy  trees.  "By 
the  way,  Jacob,"  said  the  Diplomat,  "I  left  my  stick  in 
the  car.  Will  you  get  it?" 

Jacob  turned  away  unwillingly,  but  he  must  have  had 
that  stick  concealed  in  the  folds  of  his  respectable  grey 
silk  gown.  For  a  second  later  when  the  Diplomat, 
thinking  he  had  disposed  of  Jacob,  asked,  "What  time  is 
it  by  your  watch?"  and  found  it  necessary  to  look  at  the 
watch  on  my  wrist  himself,  and  let  his  fingers  delay 
there  a  moment,  up  popped  Jacob. 

"I  got  stick,  master,"  said  he,  brandishing  the  same. 
"I  tell  Missy  about  emperor."  And  he  launched  into  a 
marvellous  history  of  royalty  expressed  in  a  fine  confu- 
sion of  misplaced  words.  Thereafter  nothing  could 
budge  him,  nor  stem  the  flow  of  mutilated  words  which 
he  called  English.  The  sun  had  set  now;  and  we  rode 
away  in  the  wake  of  Jacob  in  a  world  suddenly  gone 
ashen.  Firmly  guarded,  straitly  chaperoned,  I  cast  a 
discreet  glance  here  and  there  in  passing  at  vestiges  of 
old  godliness.  Nor  was  the  Diplomat  released  from  sur- 
veillance till  he  had  deposited  me  on  the  steps  of  the 
hotel. 

The  evening  while  we  were  walking  up  and  down  on 
the  wall  listening  to  a  Chinese  band  play  "Over  There," 
to  an  international  crowd,  I  saw  Jacob  again.  He  was 
marching  along,  serene,  lordly,  self-righteous  as  ever, 


146 

with  a  cigarette  between  his  teeth,  and  in  his  wake 
trotted  a  little  Chinese  maiden  in  green  silk  trousers, 
painted  and  shameless,  with  eyes  of  invitation  for  every 
one  or  any  one  above  her  own  cigarette. 

"I  suppose,"  whispered  the  Diplomat,   "that  he  is 
chaperoning  her  too." 


CHAPTER  XVII 

"MADAME,  i  AM  A  DETECTIVE." 

NEXT  day,  at  dawn,  a  letter  from  Dorothy  blew  in,  as  it 
were,  on  the  winds  of  the  morning.  "I  have  collected 
stacks  of  your  love-letters,"  she  wrote.  "There  is  one 
that  is  awfully  fat  and  looks  interesting.  Dad  says 
come  on  up  and  cross  to  Japan  with  us.  So  say  I  for 
I've  got  something  to  show  you — a  prince!  Yea,  my 
dear,  a  live  one,  and  I  ride  with  him  in  his  automobile." 

What  this  signified  I  could  not  tell.  Was  our  Doro- 
thy to  be  Queen  of  Tibet  or  Empress  of  the  Mongols  or 
Czarina  of  Siberian  Eussia?  In  a  rush  of  homesickness, 
I  called  my  Chinese  boy  and  told  him  I  would  leave  that 
night  for  Korea. 

The  Diplomat  and  Jacob  put  me  on  the  train,  the  Dip- 
lomat metaphorically  tearing  his  hair  and  dashing  in 
and  out  of  parentheses,  and  Jacob  beaming,  cynical,  in- 
scrutable, with  the  memory  of  all  the  other  ladies  who 
had  been  parenthetically  adored  in  his  small,  unblink- 
ing eyes.  The  Diplomat  examined  my  bunk  with  the 
air  of  a  connoisseur,  and  then,  circulating  airily  among 
the  train-guards  and  "boys,"  assured  them,  with  a  rain 
of  small  cash,  that  I  was  a  very  important  lady  and  must 
be  well  treated.  Then  standing  out  at  the  window  of 
my  compartment,  while  we  waited  for  the  train  to  pull 
out,  he  whispered  tenderly  that  he  would  exact  from 
me  just  one  promise  before  I  went. 

"What  is  the  promise?"  said  I  cautiously. 

"Will  you  dine  with  me  in  Tokyo  on  August  1?" 

147 


148  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

I  promised;  lie  kissed  iny  hand,  in  the  continental 
style  he  liked  to  affect;  and  the  train  moved  out  into 
the  grey  twilight.  It  seemed  a  little  promise  then,  and 
one  easy  to  fulfil.  But  I  did  not  guess  what  forces 
were  to  stand  in  the  way  of  it,  nor  all  the  new  life  that 
was  to  flower  for  me  in  the  sunshine  of  that  Oriental 
summer. 

Meanwhile  the  immediate  prospect  before  me  was 
nothing  to  allure  the  imagination.  I  was  in  for  one  of 
those  interminable  dusty  journeys  which  make  up  so 
much  of  the  traveller's  wanderings  over  the  vast  conti- 
nent of  Asia.  Hour  after  hour  the  desolate  land  slipped 
by,  while  I  swallowed  dust  by  the  mouthfuls,  with  peri- 
odical lubricants  in  the  shape  of  dinners  that  dragged 
through  interminable  courses.  There  were  soup  that 
tasted  as  if  it  came  from  the  rain-barrel,  sodden  fish, 
and  meat  that  had  lost  its  first  youth,  culminating  in 
after-dinner  decorations  in  the  shape  of  bland  cheese 
that  had  left  its  flavour  somewhere  en  route,  and  a  dis- 
coloured substance  that  was  called  coffee.  Two  days  and 
two  nights  of  it  I  suffered,  with  no  companion  in  my 
loneliness,  except  an  American  salesman  of  automobiles 
and  a  gigantic  Kussian  of  uncertain  destination. 

The  salesman  amused  me  with  tales  of  his  adventures 
in  selling  automobiles  to  well-to-do  Koreans.  He  was  a 
cheerful  person,  fat  and  dark,  and  inadequately  sup- 
plied with  hair,  and  he  talked  with  the  accent  of  the 
typical  American  on  the  English  stage.  "You  see  the 
Mikado,"  he  said,  "the  King  of  Japan,  he's  called  the 
Mikado — well,  you  see  he's  the  father  of  his  people,  and 
his  people  are  all  just  like  sons  in  his  family.  In  one 
way  you  might  say  the  Koreans  aren't  his  sons  exactly — 
more  like  stepsons  that  wasn't  consulted  on  the  mar- 
riage, you'd  say.  But  just  like  a  father  don't  want  his 


"MADAME,  I  AM  A  DETECTIVE"  140 

sons  to  waste  their  money — specially  if  they  are  step- 
sons and  the  old  man's  got  his  eye  on  the  cash-box  him- 
self— so  he  don't  want  the  rich  Koreans  to  waste  theirs. 
So  when  one  of  these  little  chaps  they  call  Korean  nobles 
or  princes  wants  to  buy  a  car,  he  has  to  ask  the  Mikado — 
see?" 

"And  do  you  enjoy  dealing  with  the  Mikado?" 

"Don't  you  believe  it,"  he  replied  fervently,  adding 
conscientiously,  lest  I  should  credit  him  with  moving  in 
such  high  society,  that  of  course  he  had  nothing  to  do 
with  it.  "It  just  holds  up  sales  on  the  other  end." 

There  was  another  passenger  who  spoke  no  English. 
She  was  a  Russian  flapper  under  the  escort  of  three  Rus- 
sian men,  all  equally  bearded  but  graduated  in  size,  like 
Goldilocks  with  the  three  bears.  She  was  a  thing  to 
gladden  the  eye,  beautiful  with  the  luscious,  radiant 
beauty  which  seems  the  peculiar  birthright  of  young 
Russian  girls.  Her  hair  hung  over  her  shoulders  in 
two  long  shining  plaits  which  were  of  a  kind  of  sunset 
gold,  browned  with  warm  shadows.  Her  skin  had  the 
colouring  and  downy  smoothness  of  an  apricot,  and  her 
deep  blue  green  eyes  and  slightly  pouting  lips  had  a  cer- 
tain freshness  as  of  a  garden  in  the  morning.  I  saw 
many  of  these  Russian  girls  of  the  bourgeoisie  fleeing 
from  Russia,  and  I  think  I  never  saw  creatures  in  whom 
youth  wore  an  aspect  so  nymphlike  and  dewy. 

I  was  glad  the  little  girl  was  there  to  light  the  land- 
scape for  me.  Otherwise  the  journey  was  dull  enough. 
About  six  o'clock  on  the  second  evening  we  came  to  the 
border  between  Manchuria  and  Korea  and  passed  under 
the  jurisdiction  of  the  Tenno  of  Japan.  Then  a  thou- 
sand years  fell  away  like  a  torn  garment,  revealing  ef- 
ficiency up-to-date,  spruce  and  neat  and  unmistakably 
Japanese.  The  pig-tailed  and  ragamuffin  Chinese  in  at- 


150  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

tendance  on  us  disappeared  in  favour  of  rosy,  small 
men  in  uniform,  very  rapid,  very  neat,  and  ornamented 
each  with  an  ineradicable  smile.  Pleasant  demonstra- 
tive little  souls  they  seemed,  and  though  I  was  assured 
by  American  and  Korean  alike  of  the  depths  of  their  per- 
fidy and  that  of  the  nation  from  which  they  came,  for  a 
time  I  loved  them  one  and  all.  More  colonial  efficiency 
appeared  in  the  form  of  a  clean  little  inn,  where  Japa- 
nese girls,  knock-kneed  and  willing  and  not  too  intelli- 
gent, served  a  dinner  that  had  about  it  a  kind  of  fresh- 
ness. 

Meanwhile  the  passport  officials  appeared — an  end- 
less series  of  them — and  each  one  inquired  after  the 
health  of  my  ancestors  unto  the  third  and  fourth  genera- 
tion. As  soon  as  I  was  delivered  from  these  seekers 
after  knowledge,  a  dapper  little  fellow  in  uniform 
walked  up  to  me,  and  majestically  motioning  to  me  to 
halt,  delivered  himself  thus :  "Madame,  I  am  a  detective. 
How  old  are  you?"  Very  naive  they  are,  these  Japanese 
detectives,  and  incorrigible  nuisances. 

These  borderline  ceremonies  I  had  to  go  through  with- 
out assistance.  But  at  last  I  succeeded  in  depositing 
myself  on  a  train  bound  for  Seoul,  the  capital  of  Korea. 
The  salesman  escaped  from  his  own  corps  of  detectives 
just  in  time  to  wave  good-bye  to  me  through  the  win- 
dow. There  seemed  to  be  neither  white  man  nor  Korean 
on  the  train.  I  looked  out  into  the  lights  that  wavered 
and  dimmed  and  slipped  away,  and  then  into  the  mov- 
ing darkness  without.  Once  more  I  was  launched  upon 
the  night  in  unknown  places,  and  the  dawn  I  knew 
would  shine  on  another  people  strange  to  me  and  waken 
into  life  still  other  alien  tongues. 

Next  morning  I  looked  out  on  a  lovely  land,  preter- 
naturally  fresh  and  green  beneath  the  light  mists  of  rain 


"MADAME,  I  AM  A  DETECTIVE"          151 

that  swept  it,  walled  round  with  hills  delicately  blue. 
It  had  a  fine  air  of  colonial  prosperity.  There  were 
piles  of  lumber  at  the  neat  little  railroad  stations,  and 
produce  in  cases  and  bales.  At  first  I  saw  no  Koreans, 
only  Japanese  officially  clad. 

By  and  by  the  Koreans  appeared.  They  were  a  list- 
less, dignified  lot,  clad  like  the  members  of  some  freak 
religious  sect.  The  men  wore  tight  trousers  and  long 
coats  of  unbleached  linen,  and  funny  little  hats  which 
looked  like  top  hats  improvised  for  amateur  theatricals. 
The  women  wore  dresses  with  tight  yokes  and  full  skirts, 
more  or  less  like  a  Mother  Hubbard,  except  that  the  yoke 
and  the  skirt  parted  company  and  showed  some  inches 
of  brown  skin.  Here  and  there  were  kiddies  in  bright 
coloured  replicas  of  their  parents'  garb. 

We  came  at  last  to  a  great  and  splendid  city  held  in 
the  hollow  of  the  mountains  as  in  a  cup,  walled  with 
great  walls  and  entered  by  big  red  gates.  This  was 
Seoul,  the  capital  of  the  realm.  Here  the  detectives 
and  passport  agents  were  lined  up,  awaiting  their  official 
pabulum  in  the  shape  of  news  about  grandmothers, 
row  on  row  of  these  agents,  and  all,  it  seemed,  for  the 
intimidation  of  little  me.  But  when  I  said  that  I  wished 
to  go  to  the  Chosen  Hotel,  as  the  Bishop  had  bade  me, 
a  hotel  lackey,  who  seemed  every  whit  as  big  an  official 
as  the  detectives,  whisked  me  away  in  a  taxi. 

We  rode  past  buildings  such  as  might  grace  Fifth 
Avenue  itself,  and  up  a  fine  road  to  the  hotel.  The 
Chosen  Hotel  is  a  hostelry  unparalleled  in  Asia.  It 
combines  all  the  pretty  ways  and  small  daintinesses 
which  the  Japanese  develop  for  the  delectation  of  Occi- 
dentals, with  the  luxury  of  real  plumbing  in  the  shape 
of  tiled  and  nickeled  bathrooms  and  hot  water  in  de- 
licious floods. 


152  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Entranced,  like  one  who  has  come  into  a  king's  palace 
in  the  wilderness,  I  was  led  down  the  noiseless  corridor 
to  my  pretty  room.  The  boy  deposited  my  baggage  and 
closed  the  door  behind  him.  I  turned  to  take  possession. 
A  mirror,  full  length,  gleaming,  crystalline,  caught  my 
eye.  Within  its  depths  I  saw  the  figure  of  a  Japanese 
in  a  kimono  politely  bowing  to  me.  What  illusion  was 
this?  The  door  was  closed.  I  turned.  A  little  man 
stood  before  me,  little  in  stature  but  magnificent  in 
manner.  "Madame,"  said  he,  "I  am  a  detective.  How 
old  are  you?" 

A  few  minutes  later  I  sat  down  with  a  sigh  of  relief. 
Once  more  my  age  and  grandmother  were  disposed  of. 
The  door  opened.  A  little  man  beckoned.  It  seemed  I 
must  follow.  Wondering,  vexed,  trying  to  remember 
what  injudicious  response  I  may  have  made  to  the  min- 
ions of  the  Tenno,  I  followed.  This,  no  doubt,  was  an- 
other detective.  I  passed  down  the  wide  stairway, 
through  a  room  where  a  fountain  played  and  a  Cupid 
smiled,  out  upon  a  wide  veranda  that  overlooked  a  gar- 
den. An  electric  sign  blazed  suddenly  like  a  portent 
in  the  heavens.  My  guide  pointed  to  it. 

"Movies,"  said  he. 

There  was  a  little  movie  theatre  attached  to  the  hotel, 
and  he  had  come  to  drum  up  trade! 

Despite  the  watchful  eyes  that  had  been  upon  me, 
despite  the  feeling  that  I  was  within  the  sacred  circum- 
ference of  the  Mikado's  power,  and  my  goings  in  and 
goings  out  were  now  of  deep  concern  to  one  of  the 
world's  great  thrones,  I  must  say  that  I  slept  securely 
that  night,  blessed  with  the  slumber  which  comes  only  to 
those  who  have  survived  two  nights  on  an  Asiatic  rail- 
road. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

PRINCE  AND  PAUPER 

NEXT  day,  bright  and  early,  Dorothy's  voice  sang  a 
greeting  over  the  telephone,  and  she  herself  shortly  ap- 
peared in  a  rickshaw,  very  mysterious  about  her  prince, 
laden  with  the  mighty  importance  of  my  collected  mail. 
She  volunteered  to  show  me  "the  little  old  town,"  with 
which  she  felt  herself  quite  familiar.  I  had  a  headache 
and  a  bit  of  fever,  but  I  set  forth  gallantly,  encouraged 
by  Dorothy's  assurance  that  if  I  were  very  good,  and 
told  her  what  "he"  said  in  that  big  letter,  I  might  dine 
with  the  prince  that  night. 

I  made  a  tale  to  suit  the  occasion,  to  which  Dorothy 
replied  darkly,  like  one  snatching  away  the  veil  which 
hides  her  true  soul,  that  she  was  "off  men  for  life." 
They  were  either  "cavemen,"  she  averred,  or  else  "poor 
nuts."  When  I  ventured  to  inquire  a  little  further  into 
these  revelations,  she  waved  the  matter  aside  majesti- 
cally. "Never  mind  now,  my  dear,"  she  said  with  a 
motherly  air.  "Perhaps  I'll  tell  you  some  day." 

Making  a  detour  before  beginning  the  formal  business 
of  sight-seeing,  we  paid  our  respects  to  her  father  and 
mother.  The  Bishop  was  holding  a  conference  of  pas- 
tors, but  he  came  out  courteously  to  speak  to  me  when 
I  passed  his  open  door.  Lady  I  found  happily  seated 
amidst  all  her  household  gods.  For  she  had  moved 
her  furniture  from  the  States  to  Korea  some  time  since, 
and  was  endeavouring  to  mould  one  spot  by  sheer  love 
into  a  semblance  of  home.  "We  can't  be  here  very 
much,"  she  said  wistfully,  "but  I  thought  I  would  make 

163 


154  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

one  place  in  the  Orient  seem  like  home  for  my  husband 
and  children."  Yet  she  saw  this  place  but  seldom  and 
for  so  short  a  time  that  it  scarcely  admitted  of  the 
handling  and  freshening  of  every  dear  thing. 

Sitting  and  talking  to  Lady  in  peace,  I  was  loath  to 
enter  the  rickshaw  and  set  forth  on  Dorothy's  whirlwind 
trail  again ;  for  a  strange  weight  and  oppression  of  heat 
was  upon  me,  and  I  felt  profoundly  melancholy  for 
no  visible  reason.  But  Dorothy  assured  me  that  I  must 
take  advantage  of  her  skilful  guidance  at  once  or  I 
should  never  have  it.  "Dad's  going  to  Japan  day  after 
to-morrow.  I'm  leaving  with  him,  and  so  are  you." 

This  was  news  for  me,  but  Dorothy  spoke  as  one  hav- 
ing authority  and  I  felt  too  feeble  to  protest. 

One  of  the  interesting  things  about  Dorothy  was  that 
she  changed  her  character  every  month  or  so.  Her  lat- 
est qualities,  it  seemed,  were  decision,  energy,  and  seri- 
ous-mindedness.  Apropos  of  the  last  she  said  she  had  de- 
cided that  "Every  one  ought  to  do  some  serious  reading 
while  they  are  young."  So  she  had  begun  with  the  his- 
tory of  Korea. 

We  had  slipped  down  from  the  hill  on  which  her 
house  was  situated  into  the  main  part  of  the  city. 
A  spacious  and  magnificent  city  it  seemed,  full  of 
the  most  amazing  contrasts.  The  principal  streets  were 
wide  avenues,  lined  with  bank  buildings,  post-office 
buildings,  hospitals,  and  schools — all  on  a  grand  scale, 
western  in  form  and  appointment  and  blatantly  new. 
Among  the  Japanese  who  presided  over  them  there  was 
a  beaming  air  of  pride,  boyish,  naive,  as  if  they  were  all 
saying  inaudibly :  "See  what  we  can  do  when  we  really 
make  an  effort." 

Behind  these  avenues  of  modern  traffic  rose  the 
deserted  buildings  of  the  old  imperialism — ancient, 


PRINCE  AND  PAUPER  155 

sombre,  majestic  mausoleums  of  shadows  and  treas- 
uries of  dust.  For  a  while  Dorothy  and  I  wandered 
there,  past  many  little  palaces,  and  then  through 
a  great  open  hall,  a  kind  of  pavilion  with  mighty  col- 
umns like  the  trunks  of  forest  trees,  gaily  painted  and 
carved  in  patterns  which  reminded  me  of  batik  fabrics. 
This  overlooked  a  lake  where  the  lotus  lifted  their  rosy 
heads,  the  only  living  things  in  all  this  waste  of  death. 
The  family  of  Dorothy's  prince  had  lived  here  in  the 
old  days,  but  had  been  removed  now,  by  their  guardians 
the  Japanese,  to  a  fine  new  palace  that  looked  much  like 
one  of  the  mansions  on  upper  Fifth  Avenue. 

With  the  history  of  the  family  and  all  the  skeletons 
in  its  closets  Dorothy's  attack  of  serious-mindedness  had 
made  her  quite  familiar.  She  told  me  about  "one  old 
dear"  who  had  a  "pleasant  little  way"  of  sending  bombs 
in  boxes  of  bonbons  to  the  people  he  didn't  like.  "He 
murdered  his  relatives,  too,"  she  added,  "but  as  kings 
go,  he  was  rather  efficient."  She  also  gave  me  a  circum- 
stantial account  of  concubinage  in  the  palace  from  the 
beginning,  with  an  impersonal,  unblushing  air  that  her 
mother  could  never  have  commanded. 

"And  now,"  she  said,  "having  told  you  about  all  these 
low-brows,  who  are  the  only  ones  up  to  my  level,  I'll  tell 
you  about  a  real  high-brow,  just  so's  you'll  feel  natural 
walking  around  the  palaces."  And  she  proceeded  to 
narrate  the  story  of  the  Chinese  mandarin,  who,  having 
been  commanded  to  betake  himself  from  the  imperial 
presence  because  he  had  displeased  the  Emperor,  mi- 
grated to  Korea  and  set  himself  as  a  sort  of 
king  over  the  uncivilized  tribes  he  found  there.  Re- 
ducing the  rebellious  ones  to  order  and  drawing  up  a 
code  of  laws,  he  established  among  them  the  beginnings 
of  culture  and  an  orderly  state. 


156  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

About  these  palaces  of  the  old  imperialism,  and  the 
banks  and  office  buildings  of  the  new,  clustered  the  na- 
tive huts,  more  changeless  than  either.  Perhaps  even 
the  people  among  whom  the  mythical  mandarin  first 
took  up  his  abode  had  themselves  lived  just  so.  From 
afar  these  conical  structures  of  mud,  thatched  with 
straw,  looked  like  a  crop  of  mushrooms.  The  people  who 
lived  in  them  were  a  humble  and  brow-beaten  lot,  brow- 
beaten now  most  surely,  but  not  for  the  first  time  in 
their  history.  They  crawled  about  their  tasks  with  the 
mechanical  faithfulness  of  ants,  and  so  no  doubt  they 
had  done  from  time  immemorial.  The  splendour  of  those 
great  red  palaces  had  been  an  efflorescence  from  the 
submerged  decay  of  their  lives,  and  the  caravans  that 
went  over  the  road  which  we  could  see  winding  its  way 
over  the  mountain  to  Peking,  had  carried  away  the  sweat 
of  their  brows,  in  the  shape  of  gifts  from  emperors  to 
emperors.  Mandarins  had  squeezed  them,  and  the  ruf- 
fians that  came  with  Hideyoshi's  army  had  cut  off 
their  ears  by  the  thousands  and  had  borne  them  away  to 
make  a  monument  of  conquest  in  Kyoto.  Now  the  Jap- 
anese work  them  as  coolies,  though  here  and  there  one 
of  them  grows  rich  by  trading  his  earnings,  and  aspires 
to  be  a  gentleman.  The  Japanese  claim  that  the  vast 
substratum  of  Korean  people,  who  have  always  lived 
as  the  beasts  that  perish,  are  better  off  now  than  ever 
before.  This  may  be  so,  but  an  ancient  wrong  does  not 
make  a  modern  right. 

Yet  they  were  not  the  ones  who  had  lost  most  under 
the  Japanese  rule.  In  any  country  it  is  not  the  really 
poor  who  suffer  under  the  usurper,  for  generally  they 
suffer  under  any  rule.  It  is  the  gentry,  the  intelligent 
and  independent  middle  classes,  who  associate  with  the 
love  of  their  country,  and  the  sense  of  national  freedom, 


PKINCE  AND  PAUPER  157 

the  happiness  that  they  have  made  for  themselves  by  in- 
dustrious appropriation  of  the  resources  of  their  own 
soil,  and  by  loyalty  to  the  traditions  of  their  own  race. 

As  I  thought  of  these  things,  Dorothy  was  enlarging 
on  the  subject  of  her  prince.  Prince  he  was,  indeed, 
and  of  one  of  the  old"  royal  strains  of  Korea.  Dorothy 
had  merely  sat  in  the  back  seat  of  his  car  while  he 
showed  the  city  to  her  father,  but  this  was  enough  to 
establish  in  her  mind  a  romantic  contact  with  royalty. 
She  said  he  was  "cute"  and  she  had  a  "case  on  him." 
They  were  invited  to  dinner  with  him  that  night,  and 
her  father  had  got  the  invitation  extended  to  include  me. 

By  this  time  my  cheeks  were  burning  with  fever,  and 
the  world  was  swimming  dizzily  around  me.  Clutching 
my  rickshaw  and  fighting  with  the  wheels  of  fire  on 
which  my  head  seemed  to  be  spinning,  I  told  Dorothy 
unsteadily  that  I  cared  more  for  my  own  bed  at  that 
moment  than  any  palace.  All  concern  and  advice,  she 
immediately  escorted  me  back,  and  telephoned  for  a 
missionary  doctor  post  haste.  For  two  days  I  lay  in 
my  bed  and  the  royal  dinner  came  and  went  without  me. 
So,  too,  the  day  of  Dorothy's  departure.  By  that  time, 
though  convalescent,  I  was  a  little  shy  of  Oriental 
railroads  and  decided  to  follow  her  later.  So,  after 
exacting  from  me  promises  of  self-cherishing  and  care 
in  rest  and  diet,  Dorothy  once  more  went  on  her  rapid 
way. 

On  the  afternoon  following  her  exit,  while  I  lay  low  in 
my  room  oppressed  with  a  headache  and  the  ennui  of  her 
going,  a  basket  of  roses  came  up  to  me.  There  was  no 
card.  Yet  it  seemed  to  me  that  they  were  flowers  which 
must  have  grown  in  a  garden,  full  of  the  warmth  of 
June,  and  visited  by  butterflies  and  bees.  It  was  some 
days  before  I  discovered  the  donor. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

A    CHAPTER    OF    LOVE-AFFAIRS 

AT  her  departure,  Dorothy  left  me  a  note  from  a  mis- 
sionary, remarking  that  it  contained  "bad  news,"  and 
advising  me  not  to  open  it  till  I  was  "well  enough  to 
stand  the  shock."  It  proved  to  be  an  invitation  from  an 
evangelical  lady  to  go  calling  with  her  among  the  fami- 
lies of  Christian  Koreans.  Across  it  Dorothy  had 
written,  "My  dear,  I  pity  you." 

Yet,  when  the  calls  were  over,  I  rather  thought  Dor- 
othy might  have  saved  her  pity.  Though  I  have  found 
Oriental  Christians,  in  general,  far  more  interesting 
than  most  forms  of  missionary  publicity  would  lead  one 
to  believe,  the  Koreans  are  perhaps  the  most  interesting 
of  all.  For  to  Korea  the  Christian  propaganda  has 
meant  more  than  private  conversion.  To  a  people  bowed 
down  beneath  a  hateful  rule,  restricted  even  in  the 
teaching  of  their  own  language,  insulted,  humiliated, 
and  wounded  well-nigh  beyond  endurance  in  their  na- 
tional pride,  the  American  missionaries  came  with  a 
vital  alternative  to  a  hateful  culture.  Imprisoned  as 
they  were  in  a  land  no  longer  theirs,  unable  even  to  emi- 
grate without  Japanese  permission,  the  new  faith 
brought  them  contacts  with  great  far-away  nations,  a 
sense  of  dignity  as  men,  and  a  consciousness  of  inter- 
national brotherhood.  In  the  churches  they  found  a 
form  of  social  organization  which  provided  a  genuine 
discipline  in  democratic  self-government,  and  a  unit  of 
association  in  patriotic  effort.  So  the  churches  were  not 

158 


A  CHAPTER  OF  LOVE-AFFAIRS  159 

only  religious  bodies;  they  were  rallying  points  for  na- 
tionalistic sentiment,  little  political  training  schools. 

Yet  it  was  not  of  politics  that  I  talked  to  the  women  of 
the  Christian  families,  for  women  have  always  other 
matters  to  consider.  The  first  home  we  visited  was  a 
comfortable  establishment,  with  an  air  of  middle-class 
prosperity  about  it.  Through  an  aperture  in  the  outer 
wall  we  entered  into  a  tiny  court-yard  set  with  minia- 
ture, deformed  trees,  after  the  Japanese  fashion.  Then 
we  stepped  up  into  a  low  house  which  ran  through  a  long 
series  of  rooms,  immaculately  clean,  with  a  sparse  fur- 
nishing of  American  chairs  and  chiffoniers,  and  many 
fine  Korean  chests  inlaid  with  brass  and  mother-of-pearl 
or  bound  with  brass. 

We  were  made  welcome  by  the  mother-in-law.  She 
was  a  Christian  gentle-woman  of  middle  age,  with  a 
sweet,  wrinkled  face  and  smooth,  parted  hair,  slightly 
grey,  but  heavy  and  shining.  She  had  the  air  of  one 
who  looked  well  to  her  household  and  conducted  it 
in  ways  sweet,  tranquil,  and  orderly.  About  her  es- 
tablishment there  was  the  peculiar  charm  of  a  well- 
kept  house  in  the  late  afternoon,  when  all  the  work  of 
the  day  is  accomplished,  the  last  inch  of  brass  is  pol- 
ished, the  last  grain  of  dust  vanquished — when  the  sun- 
light falls  serenely  upon  the  shining  floors,  and  the  hot 
water  sings  over  the  charcoal  ready  for  the  evening  meal 
or  tea  for  a  passing  guest,  and  the  women  of  the  house 
have  changed  their  dresses  and  are  ready  to  play  with 
their  needles  among  dainty  fabrics  or  chat  with  friends 
awhile. 

While  she  was  making  us  welcome,  the  daughter-in- 
laws,  in  fresh,  white  linen,  came  forth  to  display  their 
babies,  while  the  mother  set  a  cool,  fruity  drink  and 
cakes  like  nabiscos  on  a  lacquer  table,  round  which  we 


1GO  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

sat  on  the  floor.  As  we  talked,  the  rat  tat  tat  of  maids 
ironing  the  linen  of  the  family  in  the  kitchen  court,  by 
beating  it  with  polished  sticks,  kept  time  to  our  speech. 

The  most  interesting  member  of  the  family  was  ther 
wife  of  the  eldest  son,  whose  Christian  name  was  Mary. 
She  had  the  sweetness  and  gentle  piety  of  old  Sunday- 
school  books,  and  not  a  little  hidden  fervour.  My  com- 
panion said  to  me :  "Mary  had  one  of  the  most  wonder- 
ful trousseaus  that  has  been  seen  hereabouts."  And 
then  to  Mary:  "Won't  you  show  us  what  a  Korean 
bride  wears  when  she  may  have  all  the  fine  clothes  she 
wishes?" 

Thereupon  the  servants  brought  in  two  inlaid  chests, 
and  Mary  began  to  unpack  from  the  many  and  cunningly 
contrived  drawers  an  endless  series  of  billowing  red  and 
pink  skirts  of  heavy  brocaded  silk,  and  funny  little 
short  jackets  that  came  scarcely  below  the  armpits  and 
were  tied  together  with  strings.  The  wedding  dress  it- 
self was  scarlet.  There  were  gowns  for  all  occasions — 
gowns  in  which  to  receive  her  husband,  gowns  in  which 
to  go  back  to  call  on  her  family  for  the  first  time  after 
marriage,  and  the  like.  There  was  also  jewelry,  of  jade 
and  pearl  and  amber,  and  watches  and  rings  in  foreign 
style.  There  was  a  little  bonnet  trimmed  with  fur  with 
streamers  that  hung  down  behind.  The  general  fashion 
of  the  clothes,  and  the  manners  of  the  girl  herself,  re- 
minded one  of  some  Victorian  bride  or  an  Oriental  ver- 
sion of  the  heroines  of  Godey's  Lady's  Book. 

I  noticed  that  she  placed  the  simpler  garments  in  one 
chest  and  the  more  beautiful  silk  and  jewelry  in  the 
other. 

"These,"  I  said,  pointing  to  the  plainer  wardrobe, 
"are  the  dresses  for  every  day,  are  they  not?  And  those 
are  for  parties  and  festivals?" — for  the  Orientals  in  gen- 


A  CHAPTER  OF  LOVE-AFFAIRS  1(11 

eral  make  a  greater  distinction  than  we  between  party 
clothes  and  everyday  clothes. 

"No,"  she  said,  pointing  to  the  richer  chest,  "that  is 
God's  chest.  This  one  is  mine." 

The  missionary  explained.  Though  she  was  a  petted 
bride  and  had  all  that  she  desired  for  herself,  she  had 
no  means  of  getting  ready  cash  for  contributions  to  the 
church  and  to  causes  in  which  she  was  interested.  So 
she  had  picked  out  the  best  of  her  wedding  finery  and 
the  gifts  of  jewels  which  she  continually  received  from 
her  husband  and  friends  and  had  laid  them  away  in 
"God's  chest,"  to  be  sold  and  converted  into  money  for 
benevolences  whenever  she  wished. 

She  was  a  Christian  girl  of  the  type  that  is  largely 
passing  away  among  us,  a  type  that  had  its  own  charm. 
She  was  not  beautiful,  for  her  features  seemed  a  bit 
rudimentary,  but  she  had  the  satiny  skin  and  hair  and 
the  look  of  good  grooming  and  innocence  which  pros- 
perity and  a  protected  life  give  to  a  woman.  Gentle  and 
graceful,  and  a  little  melancholy,  she  might  have  been 
the  heroine  of  some  Korean  Tennyson.  I  thought  that 
her  pensiveness  was  just  a  general  odour  of  sanctity,  the 
air  of  one  who  kept  herself  unspotted  from  the  vulgari- 
ties and  frivolities  of  the  world.  But  I  found  later  that 
there  was  another  cause.  Although  she  had  been  mar- 
ried a  year,  there  was  no  prospect  that  she  would  give 
her  husband  a  son.  Christians  though  his  parents  were, 
and  theoretically  monogamists,  on  this  one  point  their 
traditions  were  stronger  than  their  acquired  faith.  A 
son  there  must  be,  and  if  she  did  not  produce  him  shortly, 
her  husband  must  take  a  secondary  wife.  He  was  fond 
of  her,  loved  her,  indeed,  in  the  poor  blind  fumbling  way 
in  which  a  very  ordinary  man  will  love  a  saintly  wife 
whom  he  feels  too  good  for.  him.  But  on  this  point  he 


162  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

was  a  little  restive  against  her  prejudice.  It  was  not 
only  jealousy  on  her  part.  She  felt  it  degrading  to  share 
her  husband  with  another  woman,  a  daily  living  in  sin. 
So  far  she  had  persuaded  him  to  wait.  But  she  felt  that 
his  patience  would  not  last  much  longer,  and  the  little 
wee  creature  who  held  her  happiness  in  its  hands  showed 
no  signs  of  entering  upon  this  mortal  life. 

But  there  were  Christian  girls  of  a  more  modern  type 
than  Mary,  and  at  that  time  a  mission  school  was  all 
agog  with  the  romance  of  one  of  them. 

She  was  an  intelligent,  womanly  lass  who  believed 
that  a  girl  should  choose  her  own  husband  and  love  him 
in  faithfulness  but  independence  of  spirit.  Her  parents 
were  rather  liberal-minded  folk  with  a  leaning  toward 
Christianity,  until  it  came  to  marrying  their  daughter. 
Then  they  reverted  to  type.  Without  consulting  her 
they  chose  a  husband  of  whom  she  knew  nothing,  and 
sent  word  that  she  was  to  come  home  from  the  mission 
school  and  be  married  in  the  orthodox  style. 

She  protested.  But  to  no  avail.  The  missionaries 
sympathized,  but  could  not  undertake  to  protect  her. 
Divorced  from  her  parents  and  the  husband  whom  they 
had  chosen,  she  had  no  means  of  subsistence.  She 
yielded  and  went  home.  There  was  a  great  feast  and 
a  trousseau  full  of  scarlet  and  pink  petticoats.  Patiently 
she  went  through  the  ridiculous  and  barbarous  customs 
of  a  Korean  wedding,  sitting  mute  and  blinded  with 
a  great  weight  of  bronze  on  her  head,  the  martyr  of  a 
feast  which  seems  intended  for  the  delectation  of  every- 
one but  the  bride. 

Now,  it  is  a  custom  that,  when  the  ceremony  is  over 
and  the  bride  is  left  alone  with  her  husband,  she  has 
dumbly  to  submit  to  a  siege  of  taunting  and  teasing  at 
his  hands — that  he  may  know  he  has  married  a  model 


A  CHAPTER  OF  LOVE-AFFAIRS  1G3 

of  wifely  patience  and  obedience.  Serenely  and  in  per- 
fect silence  she  is  to  carry  out  the  first  behests  of  her 
lord,  however  brutal  these  may  be.  So,  in  the  course  of 
time,  this  Christian  maid  was  left  alone  with  the  hus- 
band whom  she  had  never  seen.  Forthwith  he  addressed 
to  her  a  taunting  word  which  she  received  calmly  in 
silence.  He  continued.  She  might  have  been  Griselda 
herself,  so  perfect  was  her  deportment,  so  unvexed  her 
face.  At  last  he  said: 

"This  is  a  funny  wife  I  have  married.    She  can't  talk." 

Now  the  patience  of  Christian  wives  is  not  unlimited. 
Suddenly  she  opened  her  mouth  and  replied : 

"I  can  if  you  want  me  to." 

"I  do,"  he  said  in  delighted  accents.  "I  want  you  to 
answer  me  a  few  questions.  In  the  first  place,  did  you 
want  to  marry  me?" 

"No,"  she  replied. 

By  this  time  her  tongue  was  unloosed.  "Did  you  want 
to  marry  me?"  she  asked. 

"No,"  he  answered. 

He  studied  the  calm  face  before  him,  and  then  asked 
curiously:  "Are  you  really  sorry?" 

This  was  not  half  as  bad  as  she  expected.  With  a 
little  smile,  she  answered :  "It  might  have  been  worse." 

"I  think,"  he  said  gravely,  touching  her  hand,  "that 
on  the  whole  we  are  lucky." 

The  ice  was  broken  now.  He,  too,  was  a  Christian. 
He,  too,  had  rebelled  at  this  forced  marriage.  He  was 
delighted  to  discover  that  he  had  won  a  girl  whose  ideas 
were  like  his  own.  Before  the  first  hour  of  his  wedded 
life  had  passed,  they  had  arranged  it  all.  She  would 
go  back  to  school  and  finish  her  course.  Then  they 
would  emigrate  to  the  Pacific  isles,  and  shake  the  dust 
of  Korea  and  its  barbarous  ways  from  their  feet.  Some- 


164  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

where  they  would  set  up  a  home  which  knew  neither 
wives  nor  mothers-in-law  nor  secondary  wives,  nor  un- 
due subordination  of  the  daughters  of  Eve. 

She  came  back  to  the  school,  bubbling  with  joy,  un- 
blushingly  in  love  with  the  husband  who  had  been  wished 
on  her.  For  weeks  the  old  halls  rang  with  the  tale,  and 
one  girl  confessed  that  she  had  prefixed  to  the  Lord's 
Prayer,  which  she  said  daily,  a  private  request  that  such 
luck  might  be  hers,  too,  when  her  time  came. 

It  is  with  something  of  melancholy  that  I  recall  these 
love-tales  now,  for  less  than  a  year  later  a  revolution  in 
Korea  made  terrible  wreckage  of  these  Christian  homes. 
The  manifesto  of  the  Koreans  announcing  their  peace- 
able intentions  to  proclaim,  in  a  temporary  cessation  of 
all  labour,  their  desire  for  freedom  should  be  immortal 
in  the  annals  of  revolt. 

"1.  This  work  of  ours  is  in  behalf  of  truth,  justice, 
and  life,  and  is  undertaken  at  the  request  of  our  people 
to  make  known  their  desire  for  liberty.  Let  there  be 
no  violence. 

2.  Let  those  who  follow  us  show  every  minute  this 
same  spirit  with  gladness. 

3.  Let  all  things  be  done  with  singleness  of  purpose 
to  the  end  that  our  behaviour  may  be  honourable  and 
upright." 

Honourable  and  upright  it  was;  but  not  so  the  Jap- 
anese reprisals.  In  the  bloody  madness  that  followed, 
even  the  home  to  which  Lady  brought  her  dear  pos- 
sessions from  over  the  seas  was  burned  to  the  ground, 
and  more  than  one  Christian  girl  came  to  a  savage  end. 


CHAPTER  XX 

THE  GOLD-DIGGER 

WHILE  I  was  still  adjusting  myself  to  the  emptiness 
of  life  without  Dorothy,  a  new  friend  appeared  upon  my 
path. 

Her  name  was  Mrs.  Kingsley,  and  for  a  day  or  two 
she  seemed  quite  inexplicably  devoted  to  me.  She  was 
a  dainty  little  creature  with  a  tumbled  mop  of  coarse 
black  hair,  a  skin  of  porcelain  delicacy  and  whiteness, 
and  black-fringed  violet  eyes.  At  first  I  thought  her  one 
of  those  specimens  of  petted  wifehood  one  finds  every- 
where in  the  servant-ridden  Orient.  But  she  told  me 
the  most  astounding  tales.  Her  husband  was  an  en- 
gineer, engaged  in  surveying  the  most  inaccessible  parts 
of  China,  Mongolia,  and  Manchuria.  She  went  with  him 
everywhere,  living  in  sedan-chairs  and  on  houseboats, 
and  in  the  North  on  horseback,  day  after  day,  camping 
by  night  beneath  the  open  sky.  She  was  now  waiting 
for  him  to  join  her  on  an  excursion  into  Mongolia,  which, 
for  a  change,  they  would  make  in  an  automobile. 

The  only  other  guest  at  the  hotel  at  that  time  was  a 
tall,  blonde  man,  ruddy  of  face  and  lumbering  of  move- 
ment, who  seemed  to  have  no  eye  for  the  ladies.  I  had 
heard  that  he  was  connected  with  American  gold-mining 
interests  in  Korea,  and  dubbed  him,  for  convenience  of 
mental  reference,  the  Gold-digger. 

The  second  night  after  I  met  Mrs.  Kingsley,  as  we  sat 
together  over  coffee  on  the  veranda  of  the  hotel,  the  Gold- 

165 


166  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

digger  came  out  and  established  himself  at  a  table  not 
far  away.     She  smiled  at  him  and  nodded. 

"Mr.  Doty  is  a  friend  of  my  husband's,"  she  said.  "Do 
you  mind  if  I  ask  him  to  come  over  here?" 

He  came  and  was  introduced.  And  we  three  talked  of 
camels  versus  automobiles  as  a  means  of  locomotion  in 
Northern  Asia.  Next  day  a  note  came  up  to  my  room 
from  him.  Wouldn't  I  come  down  and  have  tea  with 
him,  and  think  of  something  amusing  to  do  afterward? 
When  I  came,  he  said :  "I  have  a  confession  to  make.  I 
have  been  trying  for  a  week  to  meet  you.  I  sent  you 
some  roses " 

This  was  my  first  hint  regarding  the  source  of  the 
roses,  and  I  thanked  him. 

"I  wanted  to  put  my  card  in,"  he  said,  "but  I  was 
afraid  you  might  think  me  fresh,  and  send  them  packing 
back  where  they  came  from.  I  watched  all  the  people 
who  came  to  see  you,  but  I  didn't  seem  to  know  any  one. 
I  even  thought  of  scraping  acquaintance  with  your 
friend,  the  pretty  flapper,  but  I  thought  that  wouldn't 
recommend  me.  At  last  I  mobilized  Mrs.  Kingsley.  She 
promised  to  make  friends  with  you  and  introduce  me." 

So  this  explained  the  inexplicable  devotion  of  that 
little  lady.  I  smiled  at  the  story. 

"But  why,"  I  asked,  "did  you  bother  with  introduc- 
tions, seeing  that  I  travelled  alone?" 

"Well,  it  was  this  way,"  he  replied.  "Once  upon  a 
time  I  was  a  freshman  in  a  western  college.  There  the 
girls — nice  girls,  too — simply  made  friends  with  the 
fellows.  When  you  saw  a  girl  you  liked,  you  talked  to 
her  and  she  talked  to  you,  and  if  you  continued  to  like 
each  other,  you  were  friends.  Then  I  came  to  Harvard, 
green  as  I  could  be.  One  day  I  saw  a  pretty  girl  on  the 
streets  of  Cambridge.  She  looked  friendly.  So  I  caught 


THE  GOLD-DIGGER  107 

up  with  her,  and  asked  if  she  minded  if  I  walked  along 
with  her. 

"  'Very  much/  she  answered,  sweet  and  cool  as  ice- 
cream. I  went  on  talking  in  a  clumsy  way,  trying  to 
placate  her.  She  said  not  a  word;  she  never  moved  a 
muscle;  she  did  not  look  angry  or  frightened.  She  just 
walked  along  as  if  I  were  not  there.  I  felt  like  an  awful 
fool.  Once  I  thought  I  saw  a  flicker  of  amusement  be- 
neath her  eyelash.  It  got  worse  and  worse.  I  didn't 
know  how  to  withdraw  gracefully,  or  how  to  keep  it  up. 
When  we  came  to  a  corner  she  turned  off,  and  I  just 
stood  there  stranded,  feeling  like  a  great  boob.  That 
taught  me  a  lesson.  Thereafter  I  always  got  an  intro- 
duction to  any  girl  I  wanted  to  know  east  of  Buffalo. 
When  I  saw  you,  I  said  to  myself :  'I  will  listen  to  her 
speech.  If  she  talks  as  if  her  grandmother  might  have 
come  from  Boston,  there  will  be  social  complications  in 
meeting  her.'  So  I  listened  the  first  day,  when  the  pretty 
flapper  came  in  to  see  you.  Sure  enough,  you  talked 
like  the  Atlantic  seaboard.  So  I  said,  'Nothing  doing, 
old  man,'  and  began  to  mobilize  social  machinery." 

I  smiled  at  the  tale.  It  represented  a  phase  of  girl- 
hood psychology  which  had  been  mine  such  a  little  while 
back.  Where  had  I  left  these  proprieties,  I  wondered, 
and  what  Oriental  influences  had  annihilated  them  with- 
out my  knowledge? 

Thereafter  we  were  friends,  and  Mrs.  Kingsley,  hav- 
ing performed  her  function,  sank  discreetly  out  of  sight. 
He  was  a  likeable  soul,  plain  of  face  and  plain  of  man- 
ner, simple  and  direct  even  to  naivete',  but,  as  it  seemed 
to  me,  a  gentleman.  He  would  talk  for  hours  about  his 
life  in  the  gold-mines,  where  he  was  the  only  educated 
man  in  authority  over  a  few  rough-neck  Americans  and 
hordes  of  Korean  coolies.  It  was  a  dull  life — dull  with 


168  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  brutality  and  ennui  of  mining  life  everywhere,  in- 
tensified by  isolation  among  an  alien  and  undeveloped 
folk.  Such  isolation  always  leads  the  white  man  to  com- 
pound with  his  own  pride  by  arrogating  over  his  more 
primitive  brothers  a  superiority  which  he  is  engaged  in 
losing  as  fast  as  possible.  The  Gold-digger's  remi- 
niscences revealed  the  texture  of  his  days,  made  up,  as 
they  were,  of  all  manner  of  sudden  and  vigorous  de- 
cisions that  must  serve  as  the  deus  ex  machina  in  the 
little  dramas  of  the  camp.  A  white  man  would  become 
infatuated  with  a  Japanese  girl,  and  must  be  made  to 
see  reason,  which  did  not  mean  a  marriage  ceremony. 
A  Japanese  detective  would  come  to  camp  and  must  be 
sent  on  his  way  rejoicing  and  no  wiser  than  he  should 
be.  The  Presbyterian  missionary  would  make  a  pastoral 
call,  and  must  be  preserved  from  just  retribution  at  the 
hands  of  men  who  objected  to  his  diatribes  on  the  sub- 
ject of  whiskey  and  soda.  Or  the  old  Catholic  padre 
would  turn  up,  and  his  ministrations  must  be  tactfully 
distributed  among  those  who  liked  his  genial  charity 
on  the  subject  of  alcohol  and  his  air  of  being  no  better 
than  they.  By  way  of  diversion,  there  were  the  feats  of 
the  Gold-digger's  little  dog,  of  whom  he  spoke  tenderly, 
as  a  man  might  speak  of  a  woman.  He  called  her  "Sweet- 
heart," and  bought  for  her  boxes  of  the  finest  chocolates 
imported  from  New  York.  The  Presbyterian  missionary 
discovered  this  practice  and  used  to  consume  these 
chocolates  himself,  to  the  Gold-digger's  extreme  exasper- 
ation, remarking :  "You  don't  waste  all  this  good  candy 
on  that  little  dog,  do  you?"  There  was  also  the  anxious 
little  Japanese  woman  who  kept  the  inn,  and  whose 
troubles  at  the  hands  of  hungry  men  were  as  numerous 
as  her  own  offspring.  The  miners  liked  to  come  in  and 
demand  "pickled  eel's  feet,"  or  some  such  likely  delicacy. 


THE  GOLD-DIGGER  1C9 

When  she  hesitated,  they  would  swear  that  it  was  a 
favourite  American  dish,  and  they  could  not  patronize 
her  unless  she  produced  it.  The  poor  little  woman  would 
go  hunting  right  and  left  among  dealers  and  importers, 
while  the  camp  inquired  daily  about  the  prospects  of 
the  feast,  and  reverberated  with  laughter  when  she  said 
yes,  she  knew  the  dish  quite  well.  Of  course  she  could 
cook  it.  They  should  have  it  in  a  few  days. 

After  a  while  I  reached  a  deeper  level  in  his  psy- 
chology. There  was  a  girl  at  home. 

At  the  age  of  eight  they  had  played  Indian  and  set  up 
a  tent  together.  When  he  caught  shiners  in  the  brook, 
she  tried  to  cook  them  over  the  open  fire,  till  her  mother 
objected  to  this  ingredient  of  the  feast.  So  she  boiled 
sweet  apples  in  a  can  of  water  instead,  and  they  were 
both  delighted  to  discover  that  they  really  tasted  like 
food.  She  promised  that  when  they  were  grown  up  and 
had  a  real  house  together,  she  would  cook  him  fried 
chicken  and  blackberry  pie  in  unlimited  quantities.  At 
fifteen  he  had  carried  her  books  home  from  school,  de- 
spite the  comments  of  the  other  fellows,  and  had  been 
her  lover  in  a  high-school  play,  on  which  occasion,  for 
the  first  time,  he  had  worn  a  dress  suit.  At  eighteen 
he  had  gone  East  to  college,  and  they  had  corresponded 
weekly.  When  he  was  a  junior  she  came  for  his  junior 
prom,  and  none  of  the  other  fellows  had  a  prettier  girl 
or  one  who  was  more  popular.  When  he  was  graduated, 
she  had  come  again,  and  he  began  seriously  to  wonder 
when  and  how  he  could  ask  her  to  marry  him. 

All  this  time  he  had  never  spoken  one  word  of  love 
to  her.  He  was  afraid  she  wouldn't  like  it,  would  laugh 
at  him  as  she  did  at  the  other  "fellows"  and  call  him  soft. 
He  merely  expected  to  marry  her,  as  she,  he  ventured  to 
believe,  expected  to  marry  him.  Then  he  had  signed 


170  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

this  contract  for  Korea.  He  thought  he  would  ask  her 
to  come  out  when  he  got  established  and  could  offer  her 
a  home.  But  he  went  away  without  saying  anything; 
he  didn't  have  anything  to  give  her  yet.  He  was  afraid 
that,  after  all,  she  might  refuse  him  and  call  him  "silly." 
She  had  long  since  ceased  to  be  so  free  with  her  promises 
of  joint  housekeeping  and  blackberry  pie.  For  a  year 
or  two  he  wrote  to  her,  but  he  worried  a  good  deal.  She 
had  other  suitors.  Was  it  fair  for  him  to  stand  between 
her  and  them?  How  could  he  ask  her  to  come  to  share 
his  wild  life? 

"Mrs.  Kingsley  shares  her  husband's,"  I  ventured  to 
suggest  at  this  point  in  the  story.  "And  she  seems  to 
enjoy  it." 

"I  know  it,"  he  answered  gloomily.  I  am  afraid  Mrs. 
Kingsley  had  set  him  thinking. 

He  went  on.  The  more  he  lived  up  there  at  the  mines, 
the  more  presumptuous  it  seemed  to  ask  a  girl  like  her 
to  give  up  her  home  and  the  delicacies  of  life  for  that. 
So  he  wrote  less  and  less  often.  It  all  began  to  seem 
more  and  more  hopeless.  He  was  inarticulate  on  paper 
as  in  speech.  He  did  not  try  to  explain.  By  and  by 
he  just  dropped  out.  She  did  not  marry  for  three  years. 
Perhaps  she  did  care.  He  didn't  know,  but  he  couldn't 
let  her  throw  her  life  away.  Now  she  was  married  and 
had  a  little  girl  baby. 

"I  suppose  she  is  happy,"  he  concluded  with  a  sigh, 
"and  has  forgotten  me.  There  never  was  any  other  girl 
in  my  life,  never  will  be,  I  suppose." 

It  was  a  touching  story,  but  exasperatingly  futile. 
My  sympathy  was  with  the  girl. 

Four  days  after  I  had  met  the  Gold-digger,  I  received 
a  cable  from  Dorothy,  urging  me  to  hurry  to  Japan, 
where  she  could  take  care  of  me.  I  smiled  at  the  mes- 
sage and  bought  my  ticket.  She  had  no  doubt  spent  her 


THE  GOLD-DIGGER  111 

whole  allowance  on  that  cable  and  would  have  to  do 
without  lemon  squashes  and  sundry  purchases  in  the  way 
of  lacquer  boxes  and  paper  lanterns  for  a  month.  The 
Gold-digger  put  me  on  the  train  and  looked  to  the  last 
details  of  my  exodus,  including  the  interview  with  the 
detectives.  I  said  good-bye  to  him  reluctantly.  The 
language  of  compliment  was  not  in  his  dictionary,  and 
the  art  of  flirtation  he  had  never  learned.  But  in  his 
dumb,  faithful,  modest  way  he  knew  how  to  serve  a 
woman,  and  his  plain  face  and  sunburned  hair  hold  an 
honourable  place  among  the  friends  I  met  around  the 
world. 

One  more  lonely  ride  through  the  verdant  and  craggy 
spaces  of  Korea,  and  I  was  out  again  upon  the  sea,  bound 
for  the  shores  of  Japan. 

And  again  there  came  to  me  that  dreamlike  spirit  of 
beauty  which  haunts  the  shores  of  these  isles.  It  was  a 
dream  which  often  woke  to  sordid  reality,  but  which 
never  lost  its  power  of  magical  return.  Again  that  fairy 
light  upon  the  sea,  something  twixt  sunlight  and  cloud, 
soothing  the  trembling  waters  into  peace.  Then  the 
islands  appeared  like  great  brooding  birds,  and  the  out- 
lines of  tall  mountains.  At  that  moment  the  sun,  en- 
tangled in  mists  as  in  a  web,  shot  a  long,  burnished  bar 
across  the  steel-blue  waters,  and  the  little  sailboats, 
hitherto  grey  as  phantom  ships,  flamed  white  and  shin- 
ing, and  seemed  to  dip  and  fly  like  flocks  of  gulls  above 
the  waters.  The  tall  mountains  drew  near,  and  then 
trees  and  little  houses,  and  smoke,  and  the  ugly  fronts 
of  foreign  buildings.  The  islands  seemed  to  step  aside, 
and  we  slid  into  port,  and  into  the  arms,  as  it  were,  of 
a  little  man  who  stood  on  shore,  sturdy,  statuesque,  and 
calm. 

"Madame,"  he  said,  "I  am  a  detective.    How  old  are 
you?" 


CHAPTEK  XXI 

THE  BISHOP  TAKES  A   HOLIDAY 

"KOMANCE  has  now  ceased  to  sit  on  my  footsteps,"  I 
wrote  from  the  depths  of  pessimism,  on  nay  first  day  in 
Kyoto.  For  a  moment  I  was  very  old  and  dry  of  heart 
and  utterly  blase.  I  felt  that  I  had  now  seen  the  world, 
and  I  did  not  like  it.  The  intolerable  weariness  of  the 
wanderer  was  upon  me,  a  degree  of  fatigue  of  which  the 
stay-at-home  has  no  conception.  There  comes  a  point 
where  the  eyes  cry  out  upon  any  more  seeing,  and  the 
ears  plead  mercy  against  any  more  hearing,  and  the 
mind  will  no  longer  heed  or  understand,  and  the  heart 
faints  against  any  new  call  upon  it  for  joy  or  pity,  and 
tortured  sense  and  soul  alike,  strained  and  pricked  and 
stretched  to  more  and  yet  more  excitement,  collapse  in 
a  kind  of  confusion  of  agony,  a  chaos  of  pain.  In  such 
a  mood  I  rattled  through  the  darkness  from  Shimon- 
oseki  to  Kyoto,  and  mentally  dickered  with  steamship 
agents  for  the  next  passage  home. 

There  was  indeed  some  reason  for  this  visitation  of 
weariness,  in  the  idiosyncrasies  of  the  Japanese  rail- 
roads. I  had  purchased  a  first-class  compartment,  which 
is  somewhat  like  a  stateroom  in  an  American  Pullman, 
though  considerably  less  spacious  and  comfortable. 
When  the  train  pulled  out,  in  walked  a  Japanese  gentle- 
man, who  began  calm  preparations  to  undress  and  stow 
himself  away  in  the  other  berth  in  that  tiny  room.  I 
called  the  train  guard  and  indicated  that  this  was,  in 
my  eyes,  a  bit  of  a  faux  pas — all  in  my  politest  manner 

172 


THE  BISHOP  TAKES  A  HOLIDAY         173 

and  most  euphemistic  vocabulary,  lest  I  should  offend 
my  fellow  passenger  who  might  not  understand  the 
squeamishness  of  foreign  ladies  in  this  matter.  I  sug- 
gested that  there  were  Japanese  ladies  on  board.  I 
should  be  very  glad,  I  said,  to  share  the  little  cabin 
with  a  Japanese  lady.  But  the  proposed  partnership 
was  impracticable.  The  train  guard  was  sorry.  It 
would  be  impossible  to  make  any  rearrangements. 

In  our  country  the  gentleman  in  the  case  would 
promptly  betake  himself  off  or  force  the  railroad  to  make 
some  adjustment.  But  my  roommate  had  no  such  in- 
tentions. He  wore  a  frock  coat  and  patent-leather  boots, 
but  he  had  put  on  no  western  chivalry  along  with  them. 
As  for  him,  he  was  now  going  to  undress  and  go  to  sleep 
in  that  other  bunk,  and,  if  I  did  not  like  it  ...  Where- 
upon I  sharply  invited  the  porter  to  set  my  baggage  in 
the  corridor,  and  left  him  in  full  possession  of  the  space 
for  which  I  had  paid  half.  By  this  time  the  rumour  of 
my  discomfiture  had  penetrated  to  ears  higher  up.  A 
person  of  more  official  dignity  arrived,  recognizing  the 
blunder,  annoyed  and  apologetic,  and,  I  fancy,  more  or 
less  afraid  for  his  head  should  I  choose  to  make  a  fuss. 
I  again  suggested  a  rearrangement  of  the  first-class 
berths  which  would  give  me  a  Japanese  lady  as  room- 
mate. He  said  that  was  impossible.  He  was  shy, 
flustered,  as  a  Japanese  will  usually  be  in  a  crisis,  un- 
able to  think  out  a  solution.  I  then  suggested  that  he 
might  make  the  gentleman  comfortable  elsewhere.  No, 
he  said,  he  could  not  ask  the  gentleman  to  move.  The 
gentleman  had  not  objected.  Since  I  was  the  one  who 
did  not  like  it,  it  was  my  part  to  move.  He  offered 
me  a  place  in  the  long  sleeping  car. 

The  long  sleeping  car  was  a  kind  of  steerage  version 
of  an  American  Pullman,  with  double  rows  of  shelves 


174  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

on  each  side  of  a  central  corridor,  and  on  each  shelf  was 
a  sleeping  Japanese.  One  of  these  shelves  was  vacant. 
I  might  occupy  it  if  I  preferred.  The  car  was  hot  and 
odorous.  The  sleepers  were  restless,  and  not  a  few  of 
them  snored.  The  little  lady  in  the  bunk  near  mine  was 
car-sick,  the  boy  in  the  bunk  next  door  ate  bananas,  and 
a  man  two  berths  away  was  drunk.  But  at  least  there 
was  a  kind  of  chaperonage  in  the  crowd.  I  succumbed 
and  turned  in.  So  all  night  long,  wakeful,  feverish, 
nauseated,  I  meditated  on  the  delights  of  a  peripatetic 
life,  and  my  soul  was  sick  within  me. 

Day  brought  a  little  comfort  in  a  glimpse  of  dawn 
across  a  bit  of  woodland  water,  and  in  the  appearance 
of  the  railroad  station  at  Kyoto,  steaming  and  glaring 
in  the  heat,  but  the  goal  of  my  long  nocturnal  horror. 
A  few  minutes  later  I  was  in  Dorothy's  arms,  and  began 
a  mental  postponement  of  the  sailing  for  home. 

As  usual,  after  the  absence  of  a  day  or  two,  I  found 
Dorothy  a  new  creature.  Gone  was  the  cynical  young 
woman,  hardened  before  her  time,  and  masking  from 
the  world  a  tragic  secret.  Something  had  touched  her 
to  eagerness  and  tenderness,  and  made  a  little  sister  of 
her,  adorable  and  loving.  It  was,  I  discovered,  a  youth 
left  behind  in  Peking,  who  had  had  the  tact  to  get  sick. 
He  was  rather  immaterial  to  her,  I  fancy,  until  at  long 
distance  he  developed  this  interesting  condition.  Now 
he  sent  her  a  complete  account  of  his  symptoms  and 
hinted  darkly  at  an  operation.  I  had  my  doubts  about 
those  symptoms,  having  myself  seen  that  youth  not 
long  since.  But  what  ingenious  man  of  one  and  twenty, 
having  found  a  way  to  melt  Dorothy  into  nursely  tender- 
ness, would  cultivate  the  virtue  of  George  Washington? 
All  the  portion  of  her  allowance  which  she  had  not  spent 
on  me,  Dorothy  had  devoted  to  cabled  advice  to  him. 


THE  BISHOP  TAKES  A  HOLIDAY        175 

The  Bishop  raised  no  objection,  but  made  it  plain  that 
she  could  not  borrow  on  the  next  instalment.  And 
Dorothy  went  about,  a  joyous  martyr,  penniless  among 
the  bazaars,  and  dependent  on  charity  for  lemon  squash. 

This  youth,  it  seems,  was  to  go  back  with  us,  when 
we  sailed  in  September,  and  Dorothy  was  solicitous  for 
accommodations. 

"Marjorie,"  she  pleaded,  having  spent  her  eloquence 
on  her  father  in  vain,  "Majorie,  do  see  what  you  can  do 
to  get  our  cabins  changed.  None  of  them  are  really  good, 
and  poor  Ted's  is  just  awful.  It's  right  where  he'll  get 
no  air  and  all  the  smells  from  dinner." 

"That,"  said  the  Bishop,  "is  what  breaks  our  heart." 

The  Bishop  meanwhile  had  discovered  the  fountain  of 
youth.  For  a  minute  he  was  no  Bishop,  but  just  a  man. 
None  of  the  churches  knew  that  he  was  in  Kyoto.  He 
had  slipped  in  silently  as  a  mere  person,  and  his  sheep 
did  not  know  his  voice.  No  boy  ever  made  more  eager 
use  of  a  school  holiday.  Not  even  the  climate  could 
restore  him  to  episcopal  dignity  while  the  blessed  ig- 
norance of  his  flock  obtained. 

The  days  were  hot  beyond  reason,  and  very  humid. 
Not  the  lovely  position  of  our  hotel,  so  high  among  the 
wooded  hills,  nor  the  voice  of  a  stream  that  sang  all 
night  to  the  Shinto  ghosts  below,  nor  the  little  breeze 
that  woke  the  twilight  to  merriment,  had  power  to  in- 
spirit the  languid  air.  Death  by  suffocation  seemed 
always  to  wait  just  outside  the  circle  of  the  electric 
fans.  Yet  though  we  were  already  wilting  when  we 
dragged  ourselves  down  to  breakfast,  he  would  appear 
brisk  and  exuberant  and  ready  for  action. 

"We  are  to  see  temples  to-day,"  he  would  announce. 
"I  have  a  list  of  five  hundred  of  them  among  these  hills 
that  are  very  fine." 


176  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

And  into  the  sunshine  we  would  ride  forth.  From 
hill  to  hill  we  travelled,  and  from  sacred  grove  to  grove, 
not  ungrateful  to  the  tradition  of  Buddha  that  leaves 
the  uninjured  trees  of  the  primeval  forest  inviolate  be- 
tween the  worshipper  and  the  hot  heavens.  We  saw  the 
Clearwater  temple,  set  high  on  a  hill  among  trees,  where 
a  wind  on  a  summer  day  is  the  reward  of  the  faithful, 
and  where  sinners  do  blessed  penance  by  standing  naked 
beneath  a  mountain  stream  that  trickles  down  over  their 
backs.  And  we  stepped  into  the  cool,  dim  hall  where  the 
33,333  images  of  Kwannon,  the  goddess  of  mercy,  stand, 
slender,  golden,  poised  in  the  darkness,  like  a  great 
hallelujah  chorus.  Each  of  these  images  has  eleven 
heads  to  see  the  sorrow  of  the  world,  and  a  thousand 
hands  outstretched  to  help. 

Grotesque  as  the  image  seems  to  the  mind,  it  is  lovely 
in  execution.  The  little  heads  are  like  a  crown  above 
the  one  sweet  face,  and  the  thousand  hands  are  like  the 
feathers  of  great  angel-wings  outstretched — delicate, 
eager,  flying  hands,  instinct  with  spiritual  life,  and  no 
two  quite  alike  in  gesture  and  unspoken  pity.  And  the 
infinite  multiplication  of  these  crowns  that  are  yet 
watching  heads,  and  these  angel-wings  that  are  hands 
of  mercy,  in  that  great  hall  of  darkness,  where  the  33,333 
images  gleam,  range  on  range,  like  stars  out  of  night, 
acts  on  the  mind  with  a  singular  hypnotism,  swing- 
ing one  out  of  the  common  world  into  a  blank  rap- 
ture of  seeing.  But  the  old  Buddhist  monk  who  stood 
guard  over  this  dim,  cool  hall  of  goddesses  was  obviously 
dying  of  tuberculosis,  and  the  cough  that  he  could  not 
restrain  rattled  the  golden  images  and  the  33,333,000 
hands  of  mercy  with  a  harsh,  sinister  sound. 

By  evening,  three  spent  but  hopeful  countenances 
faced  the  Bishop  across  the  dinner  table.  Now  at  least 


From  hill  to  hill  we  travelled  and  from  sacred  grove 
to  sacred  grove 


The  festival  begins  with  the  annual  debut  of  the  God 
in  human  society 


THE  BISHOP  TAKES  A  HOLIDAY         177 

there  was  nothing  more  to  see  for  this  day.  But,  as  we 
approached  dessert,  he  would  remark,  "Do  you  mind 
omitting  the  final  decorations?  The  rickshaws  are  wait- 
ing to  take  us  to  the  theatre." 

Not  to  one  theatre  either,  but  to  all  of  them !  Under 
his  jubilant,  tireless  leadership  we  would  ride  through 
the  tinsel  gaiety  of  theatre  street,  stopping  at  every  box 
office  to  buy  a  ticket.  We  made  one  of  an  intimate  little 
group  seated  on  cushions,  before  a  revolving  stage 
whereon  sat  a  ballad  singer  who  chanted  in  falsetto 
notes  an  epic  version  of  the  Russo-Japanese  War,  and 
we  even  shared  the  tea  of  our  fellow  spectators.  We 
listened  through  one  act  of  a  drama  of  Tokyo  high  life 
in  Occidental  style,  wherein  the  part  of  the  heroine 
was  taken  by  a  graceful  boy,  with  mincing  manners. 
We  attended  a  movie,  where  an  impassioned  expositor 
was  interpreting  to  an  astonished  audience  a  Wild  West 
film  imported  from  America,  but  deleted,  by  the  Jap- 
anese censor,  of  kisses.  And  when,  at  one  o'clock,  we 
stumbled  off  to  bed,  we  heard  the  Bishop  cheerfully  map- 
ping out  a  programme  of  sight-seeing  to  begin  on  the 
morrow  at  six. 

Among  the  excursions  that  he  planned  in  this  brief, 
touristic  interval  of  pastoral  life  was  a  visit  to  the 
imperial  palaces  in  Kyoto.  For  this  the  permits  must 
be  obtained  from  the  Imperial  Household  through  our 
own  ambassador,  with  some  form  and  ceremony,  and  the 
granting  of  them  is  supposed  to  be  an  indication  that 
you  are  not  of  too  hopelessly  common  clay.  Before  the 
imperial  permission  arrived,  the  Bishop  was  summoned 
to  a  conference  at  Karuizawa,  and,  in  three  hours,  he 
and  Lady  and  Dorothy  were  off,  leaving  the  odds  and 
ends  to  their  effects  to  be  collected  by  me.  I  intended  to 
join  them  later,  after  I  had  seen  the  pageant  of  the 


178  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

Gion  Matsuri,  and  had  carried  to  a  satisfactory  con- 
clusion the  researches  into  the  rich  old  life  of  Kyoto 
which  I  had  begun  with  the  Bishop.  Just  as  they  were 
leaving,  four  long  envelopes  arrived,  all  marked  and 
sealed  with  the  hieroglyphics  of  the  Imperial  Household. 

"If  you  can  use  these  things,"  said  the  Bishop,  be- 
stowing them  all  on  me,  "they  are  at  your  service." 

I  did  use  them — but  in  a  most  unexpected  manner — 
of  which  more  anon.  Meanwhile,  Dorothy's  arms  were 
about  my  neck,  and  she  was  pouring  into  my  ears  a 
volume  of  advice  which  dealt  with  every  conceivable  sub- 
ject, from  the  disposition  of  her  blue  blouse,  which  I 
was  to  rescue  from  the  cleaner,  to  my  conduct  in  the 
presence  of  some  not  impossible  He.  In  a  few  minutes 
they  had  departed,  taking  the  sunshine  with  them,  but 
leaving  me  the  documents  from  the  Imperial  Household 
for  comfort. 


CHAPTER  XXII 


LIFE  was  very  dull  in  that  beautiful  city  which  sits  like 
a  queen  among  her  silvery  hills,  and  all  mortality  fainted 
in  the  heat  by  day.  Only  the  nights  would  flame  into 
gaiety,  with  romping  and  laughter  in  the  tea-houses  that 
lighted  the  river-bank,  and  a  ghostly  glow  of  stone- 
lanterns  in  the  temple  retreats.  And,  after  four  o'clock 
tea,  when  a  little  breeze  floated  out  from  the  clouds  of 
sunset,  I  would  travel  out  alone  in  a  rickshaw,  to  see  the 
city  bloom  softly  into  light,  and  the  little  grey  houses 
open  their  hearts  to  the  world  and  stage  their  simple 
life  against  their  own  inward  glow.  In  these  lonely 
night  wanderings  there  was  a  kind  of  pensive  happiness. 
Yet  I  pined  a  good  deal,  I  remember,  and  scanned  the 
register  of  the  hotel  for  guests  who  might  promise  com- 
panionship, with  hope  daily  renewed  and  daily  disap- 
pointed. 

So  it  happened  that  I  saw  the  preliminary  festival  of 
the  Own  Matsuri  alone.  The  Gion  Matsuri  is  one  of  the 
most  famous  festivals  in  Japan.  It  is  said  to  have 
originated  more  than  a  thousand  years  ago  as  a  pro- 
pitiatory offering  to  the  gods  against  a  plague  which 
devastated  the  city.  It  begins  with  the  annual  d^but  of 
a  god  in  human  society.  Once  a  year  this  god,  who  in- 
habits a  red  lacquer  palanquin,  is  taken  from  the  Gion 
temple  in  Kyoto  and  given  a  bath  in  the  river  and  an 
airing  which  lasts  nearly  a  fortnight.  The  god  greatly 
enjoys  this  little  holiday.  It  is  the  only  excitement  in 

179 


180  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

an  otherwise  dusty  and  drowsy  existence  in  the  depths 
of  the  old  temple.  So  at  least  I  was  told  by  some  of 
the  boys  who  carry  him  on  their  backs.  They  say  it  is 
easy  to  take  him  out  of  the  shrine,  but  hard,  very  hard, 
to  get  him  to  go  back. 

I  saw  the  god  emerge  that  hot  night  in  Kyoto  and 
fell  for  a  moment  under  his  strange  enchantment.  As 
I  came  through  the  night  shadows  of  the  Shinto  grove, 
I  saw  temple-courts  glowing  with  lanterns.  And 
thither  by  all  the  ways  of  the  forest  scraping  feet  and 
smiling  brown  faces  were  converging,  not  uproariously 
as  in  a  Western  crowd,  but  with  a  certain  intentness  and 
pleasure  as  if  all  were  silently  possessed  with  one  vision 
and  anticipation. 

Suddenly  there  was  a  shout  and  a  flare  of  fire.  Boys 
sped  from  the  temple,  waving  bundles  of  burning  fagots 
that  shed  red  coals  and  hot  ashes  in  passing.  The  peo- 
ple stooped  and  gathered  these  coals  into  basins,  scram- 
bling for  them  like  beggar  boys  for  pennies.  This  flam- 
ing passage  of  the  boys  from  the  temple  into  the  night 
shadows  and  afar  down  a  hidden  road  to  the  river  was 
to  cleanse  the  air  against  the  coming  of  the  god.  So  at 
least  an  affable  gentleman  in  a  kimono  and  foreign  shoes 
explained  to  me. 

Even  as  he  spoke,  I  heard  a  kind  of  chanting  shout 
among  the  temple  lanterns,  and  the  palanquin  of  the 
god  swooped  from  the  temple  on  the  shoulders  of 
myriads  of  dancing  men.  Joyously  he  burst  forth,  like 
one  delivered  at  last  from  a  year  of  ennui,  and  the  men 
who  carried  him  swayed  and  swung  their  heavy  burden 
in  the  spirit  of  his  delight.  They  moved  with  a  curious 
ragging  movement,  hypnotic,  infectious.  It  was  like  the 
entrance  of  the  Bacchantes  in  a  Greek  play.  Indeed,  as 
my  friend  in  the  kimono  and  the  foreign  shoes  volun- 


THE  GION  MATSURI  181 

teered,  Bacchus,  in  the  form  of  sake',  had  materially  as- 
sisted in  the  jubilation  and  the  god's  release. 

I  don't  know  how  it  happened,  but  that  reflection  on 
the  subject  of  religion  and  alcohol  was  my  last  conscious 
and  detached  thought  in  the  matter  of  this  festival.  I 
came  to,  for  a  moment,  as  from  a  dream,  to  find  myself 
part  of  a  great  swaying  crowd  of  lanterns  and  scraping 
shoes,  moving  on  and  on  through  the  night  in  the  wake 
of  that  heaving  palanquin ;  and  then  I  forgot  again.  My 
identity,  my  foreign  prejudices,  were  merged  in  the 
strong  primitive  force  of  this  crowd  emotion  that  was 
irresistible  and  causeless  as  the  enthusiasm  of  a  great 
football  game.  Once  or  twice  I  felt  a  fleeting  conscious- 
ness of  the  strangeness  of  it  all — the  hosts  of  alien  faces, 
the  swaying,  shouting  palanquin  bearers,  sweeping 
through  the  darkness  like  a  wind.  Then  I  forgot  again ; 
for  through  it  all  there  was  a  curious,  passionate  joy, 
elemental,  senseless,  voluptuous. 

Only  when  we  came  to  a  halt  at  the  river's  edge  and 
felt  around  us  the  sober  outlines  of  the  hills  and  the 
quietude  of  the  far-off  stars,  did  I  come  to  as  from  in- 
toxication. Soberly,  wearily,  I  detached  myself,  and 
stood  by  while  they  washed  the  red  lacquer  palanquin 
in  the  river.  It  seemed  a  childish  ceremony.  Suddenly 
I  felt  very  old,  very  grave,  with  the  puritan  gravity  of 
our  race  which  long  ago  transmitted  the  mysterious, 
sensuous  exultation  of  pagan  religion  into  moral  energy. 

The  cessation  of  movement  had  partly  broken  the  spell 
for  every  one.  Lanterns  and  clacking  shoes  began  to 
wander  off  in  all  directions  into  the  darkness.  In  a  mo- 
ment, in  that  swift,  uncanny  way  in  which  crowds  in 
Japan  suddenly  disappear,  the  scene  of  brilliance  and 
excitement  was  snuffed  out  like  a  flame  in  the  darkness. 
As  I  walked  home,  every  one  seemed  to  be  already  asleep 


182  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

in  the  little  grey  houses,  and  nothing  was  abroad  in  all 
the  city,  save  a  lonely  flute  somewhere  in  the  velvet  dark- 
ness of  a  Shinto  grove. 

A  few  mornings  later  there  was  a  processional  pageant 
in  the  streets  which  lasted  the  better  part  of  a  day.  The 
guests  of  the  hotel  were  obsequiously  marshalled  into 
seats  of  vantage  on  the  balcony  of  Kuroda's  bronze  shop, 
overlooking  the  street.  They  had  flocked  in  over  night 
from  more  popular  tourist  haunts,  and  were  prepared 
for  immediate  flitting.  At  first  I  could  not  see  an  in- 
teresting personality  among  them,  though  I  scanned 
them  hopefully  and  smiled  at  every  one,  till  one  man 
rose  gracefully  and  cordially  from  his  seat,  and,  in  a 
voice  whose  sweetness  of  tone  and  finish  of  accent  con- 
trasted with  the  broad  twang  of  an  American  nearby, 
offered  his  place  to  me.  I  slipped  into  his  seat;  and  he 
stood,  silent,  behind  me,  all  intercourse  apparently 
ended  in  the  courtesy. 

But  a  minute  later  a  Japanese  in  the  white  pilgrim's 
costume  fainted  in  the  street  below,  and  the  murmur 
of  pity  that  rose  precipitated  the  whole  group  on  the 
balcony  into  conversation.  The  gentleman  from  whom 
I  had  received  the  seat,  remarked,  "Poor  fellow!  He 
has  walked  a  long  way  in  the  sun  to  obtain  merit  by 
the  sight  of  this  thing.  Strange,  what  absurdities  re- 
ligion precipitates  these  people  into!" 

"I  haven't  the  heart  to  scorn  them  for  it,"  I  answered. 
"Most  religion  seems  pathetic." 

It  was  one  of  those  remarks  which,  sometimes,  by 
accident,  tear  away  all  the  superficial  and  conventional 
barriers  between  personalities.  He  answered  it,  and  we 
fell  at  once  into  earnest  talk ;  and  thence  into  shallower 
gossip  and  an  exchange  of  notes  of  common  acquaint- 
anceship. He  knew  the  Bishop  slightly;  had,  indeed, 


THE  GION  MATSURI  183 

mentioned  some  phase  of  his  conduct  with  admiration  in 
a  recent  newspaper  article,  as  a  contrast  to  the  ways  of 
less  tactful  dispensers  of  the  gospel — and  across  his 
path  Dorothy  had  blown  like  a  wind  of  April,  leaving  a 
memory  of  freshness.  So  we  talked  far  into  the  morning. 
And  when  the  last  scarlet  float  had  straggled  by,  and 
the  music  that  was  like  a  tuneless  tinkling  of  glass  had 
ceased,  we  were  both  sorry  that  it  was  over,  and  yet 
unwilling  to  presume  upon  this  accidental  contact. 

"Perhaps  you  will  come  here  to  see  the  rest  of  the 
pageant  this  afternoon?"  he  ventured. 

"Yes,"  I  said. 

But  promises  that  depend  on  Japanese  performances 
go  the  way  of  other  best-laid  plans.  The  pageant  that 
afternoon  did  not  pass  Kuroda's,  nor  take  place  accord- 
ing to  schedule,  though  schedules  of  various  sorts  were 
announced.  It  was  all  casual,  wayward,  vague  as  to 
time  and  place.  One  seemed  to  run  into  knights  of  the 
Middle  Ages  in  lacquered  armour  and  priests  in  old  bro- 
cade at  every  street  corner,  and  here  and  there,  from 
some  scarlet  float  temporarily  stranded,  the  waxen 
figures  of  old  heroes  nodded  inanely  and  forlornly.  But 
the  temporal  and  spatial  location  of  the  main  pageant 
remained  a  mystery,  and  in  trying  to  find  it  among  the 
debris  of  the  festival,  we  lost  each  other.  Then  I  re- 
membered that  I  had  given  him  no  means  of  locating  me 
at  my  abode.  As  for  him,  he  said  he  had  come  in  from 
Nara,  and  was  returning  that  evening.  Where,  I 
wondered,  was  Nara?  As  I  stood  on  my  little  balcony, 
like  one  who  sees  a  fortune  snatched  suddenly  from  be- 
neath his  hand,  a  fussy  little  policeman  in  white  came 
strutting  up.  Had  I  not  heard  the  announcement?  No, 
I  had  not  heard  the  announcement,  and,  if  I  had,  I 
should  not  have  believed  it.  Believing  the  announce- 


184  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

ments  regarding  the  pageant  had  left  me  stranded  here, 
a  forlorn  and  deserted  maiden.  Thereupon  the  po- 
liceman severely  informed  me  that  the  brothers  of  the 
Crown  Prince  were  to  pass  that  way.  Would  I  not  deign 
to  go  down  into  the  street?  It  was  not  permitted  that 
any  one  should  look  down  upon  imperial  royalty  from 
above.  To  the  street  I  went,  peevish,  irreverent,  demo- 
cratically averse  to  princes. 

Suddenly  a  signal  from  the  police  told  that  the  mo- 
ment had  arrived.  I  expected  one  of  two  things.  I  ex- 
pected to  see  the  princes  pass  in  regal  and  religious  state, 
as  befits  a  royalty  that  is  looked  upon  as  divine  on  this 
day  of  a  great  national  celebration;  or  else  I  expected 
them,  like  a  public  man  of  the  West  on  a  public  occa- 
sion, to  go  by  in  an  automobile,  acclaimed  by  the  people 
and  bowing  acknowledgments.  In  either  case  I  expected 
some  great  enthusiasm  and  curiosity  among  the  people. 
Instead,  there  fell  a  dead  silence,  an  almost  painful  con- 
straint. A  big  red  automobile  flashed  down  the  road; 
I  caught  a  glimpse  of  two  correct-looking  young  men 
in  khaki-coloured  uniforms — and  it  was  all  over.  The 
people  dared  breathe  again.  It  took  fifteen  minutes  for 
them  to  return  to  full  gaiety  and  naturalness.  There- 
after the  pageant  meandered  on  through  the  afternoon 
into  the  night,  but  my  cavalier  returned  no  more,  and 
loneliness  closed  in  upon  me  with  the  darkness. 


CHAPTEE  XXIII 

FOOTPATHS  IN  THE  SACRED  MOUNTAINS 

NEXT  morning  Kyoto  wore  such  an  after-the-ball-is-over 
look  that,  when  an  itinerating  missionary  hailed  me,  and 
offered  to  take  me  along,  on  his  way  to  Ohara,  I  ac- 
cepted gladly.  In  such  jaunts  with  gospellers  one  conies 
nearer  to  the  life  of  the  common  people  than  foreigners 
in  general  can  otherwise  do.  Ohara  is  a  pretty  hamlet 
at  the  foot  of  a  sacred  and  historic  mountain,  whose 
sturdy  girls  and  brawny  youths  are  especially  devoted 
to  the  service  of  the  Imperial  Household.  The  Ohara 
girls  are  famous  throughout  the  countryside.  They  are 
no  meek,  shuffling,  blushing  misses,  like  the  Nesans  of 
the  city  inns.  They  are  bold,  high-stepping  young 
women  who  look  you  straight  in  the  eye.  It  is  a  pleas- 
ure to  meet  them  striding  along  a  mountain  road  in 
the  morning  with  masses  of  dewy  lotus-blossoms  on  their 
heads.  They  look  like  nut-brown  heroines  of  a  Theo- 
critean  idyl.  One  knows  them  by  their  headdress,  a 
handkerchief -like  cloth  tied  around  their  heads ;  but  one 
recognizes  them  still  more  by  their  bold,  upright,  sturdy 
bearing. 

We  set  out  in  rickshaws  on  a  morning  of  mists  which 
soon  turned  into  light  rains.  But  as  the  city  fell  below 
us,  and  the  hills  and  tall  trees  rose  around  us,  the  kura 
mayo,  who  drew  me  became  a  pitiful  thing.  His  stream- 
ing perspiration  and  gasps  as  of  one  dying  intruded  be- 
tween me  and  all  I  wished  to  look  upon,  like  conscience 
made  visible.  When  human  frames  are  put  to  the  labour 

185 


186  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  a  beast  of  burden,  there  is  something  pathetic  in  their 
inadequacy  compared  with  those  of  almost  any  brutes. 
It  was  never  his  body  that  made  man  the  lord  of  crea- 
tion. So  I  left  my  human  horse  alone  to  carry  only  him- 
self, and  travelled  along  on  my  own  two  feet.  All 
around  us  the  rain  was  falling;  hidden  streams  were 
tinkling  and  trickling  among  the  leaves  of  the  wooded 
hillsides;  and  there  was  the  fresh,  damp  fragrance  of 
rain-soaked  forest-earth.  The  rain  induced  a  peculiar 
feeling  of  solitude  in  these  mountain  fastnesses.  In 
sunshine  there  is  always  something  companionable. 

As  we  drew  near  to  Ohara,  we  noticed  a  number  of 
animated  haystacks  bobbing  up  and  down  in  the  road. 
One  of  the  haystacks  rose  up  to  greet  us,  revealing  above 
a  straw  raincoat  the  brown  face  and  cheerful  smile  of 
an  Ohara  girl.  She  said  the  young  princes  whom  we 
had  seen  in  Kyoto  were  coming  to  spend  a  few  days 
in  retirement  on  the  mountain.  In  their  honour  the 
whole  population  of  the  place  had  turned  out  to  clean 
up  the  road.  With  this  announcement  she  returned  to 
the  other  straw  raincoats  and  continued  her  work. 
Meanwhile,  a  small  child  stood  by  under  an  orange- 
coloured  paper  umbrella.  When  he  saw  us,  he  burst 
forth  into  song.  He  was  singing  "Nearer,  My  God,  to 
Thee."  The  missionary,  thinking  this  indicated  a  hope- 
ful state  of  mind,  gave  him  a  tract  printed  on  pink 
paper,  something  about  God,  the  Father.  This  the  child 
eyed  with  hostility  and  suspicion.  He  would  hold  no 
conversation  with  us.  When  we  started  on,  his  voice 
behind  us  once  more  took  up  the  hymn. 

Beyond  the  village  rose  the  sacred  mountain  of 
Hiesan,  and  as  we  followed  a  little  path  which  promised 
to  relieve  us  of  an  escort  composed  of  most  of  the  in- 
habitants of  the  village,  we  found  ourselves  ascending 


How  girls  read  and  study 


It  was  a  day  of  mists  which  soon  gave  place  to  warm  rain 


In  honour  of  the  young  princes  the  population  had  turned  out 
to  clean  up  the  road 


FOOTPATHS  IN  SACKED  MOUNTAINS    1ST 

into  its  gloomy  and  dripping  dusk.  Soon  the  mon- 
astery buildings  began  to  emerge,  not  gorgeous  and 
gilded  things  like  the  imperial  temples,  but  great  halls 
that  looked  as  if  they  might  have  grown  out  of  the  forest 
as  naturally  as  trees  and  blossoms,  for  they  were  built 
wholly  of  forest  wood  which  had  become  a  lodging  place 
for  grass  and  mosses,  and  their  beautiful  roofs  were 
made  of  shingles,  fine  as  paper,  laid  one  over  the  other 
in  hundreds  of  layers,  shaped  and  fashioned  with  a 
sweep  of  upcurled  eaves  and  faintly  furred  with  moss. 
The  rain  had  caressed  those  roofs  and  the  sunshine  had 
loved  them  and  the  wind-blown  seeds  and  creatures  of 
the  air  had  lingered  on  them  and  given  birth  to  all  man- 
ner of  living  things,  till  they  had  lost  all  the  rigidity 
of  man-made  creations,  and  their  substance  and  soul 
were  wholly  of  the  forest. 

Now  they  were  deserted,  except  for  a  little  old  man, 
subdued  and  churlish,  who  was  making  ready  for  the 
advent  of  the  young  princes.  Looking  upon  them,  I 
thought  of  the  marvellous  history  of  these  mountains,  of 
the  warrior  monks  who  had  encamped  here  and  had 
raided  the  valleys  below,  and  of  the  emperors  who,  in 
the  days  when  the  Shogun,  the  military  regent,  had 
usurped  all  imperial  power,  had  worn  out  their  lives 
here  in  involuntary  retirement  as  Buddhist  monks,  and 
had  become  holy  against  their  will. 

But  mostly  I  thought  of  Benkei,  whose  deeds  became 
an  uproarious  legend.  Benkei  was  a  fighting  priest 
of  enormous  stature,  who  conquered  a  thousand  knights 
one  by  one  in  single  combat.  Once  he  stole  the  bell 
from  the  temple  of  Mii-dera.  Toiling  wearily  over  these 
hills  with  it,  he  came  to  a  Buddhist  monastery.  The 
priests  offered  him  hospitality.  His  acceptance  of 
it  was  a  bit  appalling,  for  he  sat  down  forthwith  and 


188  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

swallowed  the  contents  of  a  kettle  of  soup  five  feet  in 
diameter.  After  this  repast  he  began  to  feel  genial.  So 
he  offered  to  let  each  priest  strike  the  bell  once.  Now 
the  bell  of  Mii-dera  is  not  an  object  to  tamper  with. 
Like  other  great  Buddhist  bells,  it  is  something  half 
divine,  yet  subject  to  caprices  of  hate  and  love,  and 
enormously  self-willed.  Among  other  things,  it  was,  in 
those  days,  a  woman-hater,  but  that  is  another  story. 

So  now,  when  the  first  priest  approached  and  struck 
it,  instead  of  giving  forth  its  usual  deep,  sweet,  mel- 
ancholy boom,,  boom,  it  spoke  out  boldly  in  a  human 
voice,  saying,  "I  want  to  go  back  to  Mii-dera."  In  vain 
Benkei  attempted  to  elicit  a  sound  less  disconcerting. 
The  bell  refused  to  say  anything  except,  "I  want  to  go 
back  to  Mii-dera."  At  last  Benkei,  in  wrath,  kicked  it 
down  hill,  over  the  very  hill  that  we  had  climbed.  Koll- 
ing  over  stones  and  the  coiled  roots  of  trees,  it  went 
clanging  its  message  to  all  the  forest,  "I  want  to  go 
back  to  Mii-dera."  And  there  was  no  peace  in  all  the 
woods  till  the  wish  was  fulfilled.  When  it  was  finally 
returned  to  its  temple,  it  peaceably  subsided  into  its 
former  melodiousness,  and  never  used  human  speech 
again.  But  it  carries  on  its  surface  to  this  day  the 
scratches  it  received  in  its  protesting  career  down  this 
mountain.  Afterwards,  when  the  companionship 
snatched  from  me  at  the  Gion  Matsuri  was  restored,  I 
heard  its  pure,  deep  tones  speaking  into  the  sunset 
among  the  groves  of  Mii-dera,  and  though  it  hates  all 
women,  because  their  love  is  dearer  to  men  than  the 
peace  of  Buddha,  its  voice  did  not  sound  harshly  in  the 
ears  of  the  girl  from  the  West. 

As  we  climbed  the  slopes  so  storied,  our  retinue  fell 
away,  leaving  us  to  the  escort  of  three  bare-legged  school 
boys  under  three  paper  umbrellas  of  blue  and  purple 


FOOTPATHS  IN  SACRED  MOUNTAINS     189 

and  green.    Solemnly,  silently  they  strode  along  behind 

us,  keeping  step  with  their  three  pairs  of  wooden  clogs, 

like  soldiers.     The  missionary  addressed  compliments, 

jokes  and  sermons  to  them — all  equally  in  vain.    When 

we  stopped,  they  stopped  and  squatted  on  their  heels  in 

a  row  under  their  three  umbrellas.     When  we  started 

again,  they  started,  and  their  little  feet  went  clack, 

clack,  clack,  behind  us.    At  last  we  came  to  a  waterfall 

on  the  top  of  the  mountain,  creaming  and  foaming  in 

a  lonely  beauty  among  the  trees.    For  a  moment  we  sat 

on  a  wet  rock  to  rest,  while  the  missionary  improved  the 

opportunity  by  telling  the  little  boys  that  God  made 

the  waterfall,  and  they  should  be  grateful  accordingly. 

In  conclusion  he  gave  them  a  text :    "God  is  Love,"  and 

asked  them  if  they  would  remember  it.     "Hai"  said 

they,  nodding  solemnly,  with  great  round  eyes.     They 

had  not  another  word  to  say.    When  we  rose  to  go,  they 

rose,  tramping  three  by  three.     It  was  growing  dark 

now.     Suddenly  out  of  the  drip  of  the  rain  and  the 

rattle  and  sigh  of  the  forest  trees,  and  the  roar  of  the 

stream  that  plunged  at  our  feet,  rose  the  sound  of  shrill 

and  rhythmical  shouting,  insistent  as  the  voice  of  the 

bell  of  Mii-dera,  hurled  downward  along  this  self-same 

path,  and  punctuated  by  the  clack,  clack,  clack,  of  three 

pairs  of  feet.    The  missionary  paused. 

"Do  you  know  what  they  are  saying?"  he  asked,  de- 
lighted. "They  are  saying  over  and  over  the  text  I  gave 
them." 

By  what  grace  of  sound  or  sentiment  it  had  caught 
their  fancy  I  do  not  know,  but  all  the  way  down  they 
shouted  in  chorus,  announcing  to  the  trees  and  shadows 
and  Shinto  ghosts  of  that  forest  place,  "God  is  Love. 
God  is  Love." 

By  the  time  we  reached  the  village,  night  had  fallen. 


190  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

After  a  bowl  of  rice  flavoured  with  outrageous  pickles, 
and  lubricated  with  bitter  green  tea,  the  missionary 
said  that  his  labours  were  not  yet  over.  Would  I  fol- 
low him?  I  followed. 

I  did  not  know  where  I  was  going,  but  I  kept  on, 
between  tall,  straight  trunks  of  trees,  under  dripping 
leaves,  into  the  midst  of  that  Japanese  forest  on  that 
rainy  night,  following  a  paper  lantern  which  travelled 
as  erratically  as  a  will-o'-the-wisp  and  glowed  gro- 
tesquely like  a  pumpkin  on  Hallowe'en.  Bye  and  bye  we 
came  to  a  gleam  of  light  in  the  woods  that  gave  a  silvery 
beauty  to  the  half  seen  trunks  of  trees,  and  twinkled 
in  casual  rain-drops.  It  came  from  a  thatched  house. 
Within  we  could  see  a  platform  of  clean  matting  and  a 
little  old  man  and  a  little  old  woman  sitting  on  their 
heels  eating  rice. 

Why  had  I  come?  I  didn't  know.  It  was  as  if  I  had 
accidentally  walked  through  a  Japanese  print,  like  Alice 
stepping  through  the  looking  glass,  and  didn't  know 
what  to  do  now  that  I  was  there.  But  I  took  off  my 
shoes  and  sat  on  my  feet  obediently,  while  the  little  old 
man  and  little  old  woman  bumped  their  heads  on  the 
matting  in  front  of  me,  and  offered  me  pale  green  tea, 
with  airy  cakes,  on  a  red  lacquer  table.  What  was  I 
doing  there?  Then  I  noticed  familiar  paraphernalia. 
Light  dawned.  Oh,  that  missionary!  He  had  brought 
me  to  a  Christian  meeting. 

The  meeting  had  not  yet  materialized.  I  merely  recog- 
nized the  preliminary  signs.  But  it  materialized  shortly 
in  the  persons  of  three  young  Japanese  evangelists, 
studious,  gentlemanly  lads  in  crisp  cotton  kimonos. 
They  opened  the  meeting  by  drinking  tea.  Then  sit- 
ting in  a  semi-circle,  and  looking  as  composed  as  Buddha 
on  his  lotus  flower,  they  began  to  sing  "In  the  Cross 


FOOTPATHS  IN  SACKED  MOUNTAINS     191 

of  Christ  I  Glory,"  reverently,  with  bowed  heads.  The 
fact  that  they  were  congregation,  choir,  and  preacher 
all  in  one  apparently  did  not  disturb  them. 

The  effect  was  magical.  Outside  in  the  fragrant,  wet 
darkness  of  the  forest,  we  heard  a  low  scraping,  then 
a  running  on  wooden  shoes.  One  by  one  small,  im- 
passive faces  with  round  eyes  filled  up  the  space  beyond 
the  matting-covered  platform.  They  kept  coming,  more 
and  more — mothers  with  babies,  schoolboys,  and  snif- 
fling schoolgirls. 

The  evangelists  kept  on  singing.  One  by  one  those 
little  yellow  children  stepped  out  of  their  wooden  shoes 
and  climbed  upon  the  platform.  Seating  themselves  in 
rows  before  the  evangelists,  and  taking  up  the  tune,  they 
began  to  sing,  too.  It  was  apparently  as  much  fun  as 
a  Shinto  festival;  the  boys  who  carried  the  sacred  car 
from  the  Gion  temple  for  its  annual  bath  in  the  river 
seemed  to  get  no  more  pleasure  out  of  their  religious 
exercises.  There  was  a  pagan  freedom  and  mirth  in 
those  small  Christians,  swaying,  singing,  shouting,  all 
together  in  the  name  of  Jesus,  and  all  the  time  more  of 
them  kept  coming,  and  the  volume  of  music  penetrated 
farther  and  farther  into  the  wet  night. 

Then  into  the  assembly  came  a  man  shaven-headed. 
He  had  sweet  and  intellectual  features.  As  he  entered 
the  room  where  the  children  were  singing,  he  prostrated 
himself  in  prayer.  Then  he  came  over  to  us,  and  salut- 
ing many  times,  bowed  his  head  to  the  floor.  This  was  a 
Buddhist  priest  who  had  become  a  Christian  and  had 
come  many  miles  to  see  this  Christian  meeting.  He 
was  a  good  Christian,  the  missionary  said,  but  a  bit  of 
a  Puritan.  He  believed  in  a  strict  observance  of  the 
Sabbath,  which  is  not  a  popular  institution  in  Japan. 
He  really  had  a  beautiful  face.  It  was  beautiful  as  the 


192  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

faces  of  the  old  mothers  of  a  passing  generation  whom 
we  used  to  see  reading  their  Bibles  in  the  quiet  of  the 
afternoon,  when  the  work  of  the  day  was  done. 

Meanwhile,  at  a  signal  from  the  evangelists,  the  chil- 
dren were  repeating  the  Lord's  Prayer  in  Japanese. 
Each  put  his  two  hands  over  his  eyes,  some  of  them  clos- 
ing their  eyes  very  tight,  some  of  them  winking  mis- 
chievously between  their  fingers.  Then  they  bowed  their 
heads  to  the  floor,  as  in  the  extreme  form  of  Japanese 
salutation,  and  repeated  "Our  Father"  with  much 
rhythm  and  energy.  It  seemed  almost  like  a  game  to 
them — this  praying  and  singing.  To  most,  perhaps,  it 
would  never  be  anything  more.  But  many  influences 
enter  into  the  making  of  a  man.  Perhaps  there  were 
those  among  them  to  whom  some  day  the  beautiful 
phrases  of  "Our  Father,"  or  the  cadences  of  the  hymns, 
would  come  back  illumined  with  sudden  meaning,  and 
whose  lives  would  be  the  richer  for  hints  of  other  worlds 
of  feeling,  of  possible  standards,  brought  to  them  by 
men  of  alien  customs  from  a  far-away  land. 

We  left  them  singing,  and  as  we  went  forth  into  the 
rain  and  the  woods,  we  came  upon  more  than  one  of 
their  parents,  too  shy  to  go  to  the  meeting,  standing 
under  paper  umbrellas  among  the  bushes,  listening  with 
wonder  and  bewilderment  to  the  religious  performances 
of  their  off-spring. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

AN    UNINVITED   GUEST   OF  THE   MIKADO 

BY  next  morning  the  last  Occidental  guest  had  van- 
ished from  Kyoto,  and  even  the  missionaries  were  woo- 
ing the  mountain  winds  of  Karuizawa.  But  I  lingered, 
alone  in  the  imperial  city,  pursuing  my  studies  and  writ- 
ing steadily  by  day,  through  lack  of  temptation  to  do 
otherwise,  and  dreaming,  a  little  wistfully,  among  the 
Buddhist  groves  in  the  twilight.  It  was  calm  and  pen- 
sive life,  in  which,  for  a  time,  I  seemed  wholly  identified 
with  this  stream  of  alien  mortality,  and  all  per- 
sonal hopes  and  desires  were  held,  as  it  were,  in  sus- 
pension. 

Yet,  when  evening  came,  it  seemed  lonely  in  the  echo- 
ing rooms  of  the  hotel,  and  the  bareness  of  the  dining- 
hall  grew  well-nigh  intolerable.  Sometimes,  coming  in 
hot  and  tired,  I  would  shake  out  some  pretty  dinner 
gown,  teasing  myself  with  the  notion  that  there  might 
be  a  new  guest  at  dinner,  in  whose  eyes  I  might  shine. 
But  the  friendliest  glance  that  caught  the  sheen  of 
my  silk  or  the  gleam  of  my  silver  slippers  was  my  own, 
trying  to  smile  back  from  the  long  mirror  en  route  to 
the  dining-room,  and  next  evening  I  would  relapse  for- 
lornly into  white  duck. 

Then,  one  day,  there  came  a  letter  suggesting  that  I 
should  see  Nara.  Nara,  said  the  letter,  is  the  old  city 
where  Japan  first  attained  to  something  like  civiliza- 
tion under  the  tutelage  of  Buddhist  sages.  It  was  the 
seat  of  the  first  emperors,  and  is  still  the  hiding-place 

193 


194  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  some  of  the  best  and  most  ancient  of  Japanese 
Buddhist  art.  Nara — Nara — what  obscure  memories  of 
pleasure  did  that  word  stir  in  my  unconscious?  Ah — the 
one  gleam  of  companionship  that  had  flashed  across 
my  loneliness  had  come  out  of  Nara ! 

There  is  only  a  ride  of  two  or  three  hours  on  a  leisurely 
Japanese  railroad  train,  before  one  steps  off  into  the 
ancient  and  mossy  peace  of  Nara.  It  is  a  little  city, 
which  fades  away  into  a  fabulous  forest.  That  forest  is 
something  such  as  we,  of  the  new  Western  World,  never 
see,  nor  can  even  understand.  Its  trees  are  great  and 
old  as  in  the  primeval  forests  of  our  own  northwest,  and 
the  green  life  grows  in  a  riot  at  their  feet,  untamed,  un- 
trimmed,  as  in  the  deepest  solitude.  But  the  mossy 
paths  beneath  those  trees  are  storied  as  the  streets  of 
Rome  or  London,  the  trails  of  kings  and  priests  through 
thirteen  centuries,  and  the  record  of  the  footprints  of  a 
people.  And  among  the  dark  and  towering  branches 
that  make  so  rich  a  gloom  against  the  sun,  blaze  the 
red  courts  of  temples  where  a  Shinto  priestess,  who  is 
only  a  slender  slip  of  a  girl,  with  whitened  face  and 
scarlet  robes,  will  dance  to  the  clack,  clack,  clack  of 
the  priest's  bamboo  instruments.  In  another  place,  the 
Nara  Buddha,  a  gracious,  golden,  benignant  figure,  in- 
habits these  sylvan  shadows.  Yet  so  riotous  is  the  tan- 
gle of  the  forest  all  about  that  it  is  only  slowly  that  one 
realizes  how  rich  a  human  and  spiritual  life  has 
blossomed  in  this  green  fastness,  nor  how  many  gods  and 
ghosts  there  are  who  call  it  home.  The  sweetest  in- 
habitants are  not  the  minions  of  Heaven,  nor  yet  of  the 
Tenno,  but  the  wild  deer.  From  every  thicket  their 
great  dark  eyes  look  forth,  and  if  you  move  gently  among 
the  leaves,  they  will  even  come  forth  and  nose  your 
hand  softly,  or  skip,  girl-like,  in  friendliness  behind  you 


A  small  boy,  under  an  orange-coloured  umbrella,  began  to  sing, 
"Nearer,  my  God,  to  Thee" 


Small,  impassive  faces  filled  up  the  space  beyond  the  platform 


I  stepped  off  into  the  ancient  and  mossy  peace  of  Xara 


The  sweetest  inhabitants  of  Nara  are  the  wild  deer 


AN  UNINVITED  GUEST  OF  THE  MIKADO     195 

on  the  path.  In  this  forest  there  is  also  a  great  bell, 
whose  slow,  harmonious  boorn,  boom,  is  the  richest  of  all 
mortal  sounds,  and  when,  among  the  lofty  cool  trees,  it 
strikes  upon  your  ear,  it  seems  like  the  beating  of  the 
heart  of  this  old,  mysterious  world. 

If  there  were  any  footsteps  that  I  half  expected  to 
meet  along  those  mossy  paths,  or  a  human  voice  to  break 
the  ghostly  music  of  the  bell,  I  was  disappointed.  The 
hotel  was  empty,  though  gossip  of  an  American  I  recog- 
nized clung  about  the  place.  It  seems  that  Prince 
Arthur  of  Connaught  had  come  there  shortly  before, 
travelling  as  a  simple  gentleman,  with  another  simple 
gentleman  who  was  an  earl.  But  the  Japanese  were  de- 
termined that  he  should  abate  none  of  his  princeliness, 
and  kept  him  to  place  and  ceremony  against  his  will. 
One  morning,  when  the  prince  issued  from  the  hotel, 
there  were  the  rickshaw  men,  bowed  down  with  their 
heads  in  the  dust,  and  the  rest  of  the  Japanese  neigh- 
bourhood frozen  to  reverence,  while  below  stood  a  little 
policeman  in  white,  stationed  to  see  that  no  common  foot 
should  contaminate  the  path  that  the  prince  was  shortly 
to  make  holy.  At  the  same  time  a  young  American, 
walking  across  the  lawn  from  the  hotel  where  he  and  the 
prince  were  fellow  guests,  stepped  all  unwitting  upon 
the  consecrated  dirt.  "Stop,"  ejaculated  the  policeman, 
producing  his  one  word  of  English  under  the  stimulus  of 
this  terrible  crisis.  The  American  stopped.  But  what 
was  he  to  do  next?  There  was  the  prince  in  his  rickshaw, 
and  there  was  he,  two  Caucasians  on  a  Japanese  land- 
scape with  the  etiquette  of  the  English-speaking  peoples, 
in  these  matters,  to  uphold  between  them.  But  Amer- 
ican education  includes  no  training  for  such  encounters. 
To  the  little  Japanese  policeman  the  matter  was  easy: 
a  prince  and  a  commoner — down  on  your  knees,  Sir! 


196  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

But  suppose  the  prince  had  a  sense  of  humour,  and  he 
was  looking  quite  as  if  he  did.  At  this  point  the  Amer- 
ican settled  the  matter  by  standing  courteously  by,  as 
one  gentleman  in  the  presence  of  another,  and  bowing 
and  lifting  his  hat.  Whereupon  the  prince,  exchanging 
a  friendly  and  quite  appreciative  smile  with  his  Amer- 
ican cousin,  bowed,  too,  and  lifted  his  hat,  But  the  eye 
of  a  Japanese  coolie  gleamed  astonished  from  the  dust: 
"Was  this  American,  too,  a  prince?"  Remembering 
in  what  chill  and  awful  state  the  young  Japanese  princes 
had  passed  at  Kyoto,  I  found  this  tale  of  informal  roy- 
alty amusing. 

After  two  days  in  Nara  I  returned  to  Kyoto  with  a 
world  of  beauty  to  remember,  and  tongue  and  mind  alike 
restless  for  human  converse.  On  the  night  of  my  ar- 
rival I  once  more  tempted  Providence  with  a  display  of 
dinner  dress.  And  this  time  the  charm  worked;  for  I 
had  scarcely  finished  my  lone  and  stately  repast  in  the 
big  dining-hall  when  the  card  of  a  caller  came  to  me. 
I  looked  at  the  name  on  the  card.  "So  God,"  I  thought, 
"is  good  to  me,  after  all!" 

Sydney  (for  I  will  now  call  him  by  his  proper  name, 
since  I  can  think  of  no  fictitious  substitute  which  slips 
more  pleasantly  from  the  tongue,  and  is  richer  in  manly 
and  knightly  associations),  Sydney  had  come  to  Kyoto 
about  the  time  I  had  gone  to  Nara,  impelled  by  vague 
impulses  which  he  later  elucidated,  and  had  been  walk- 
ing in  my  abandoned  footsteps,  while  I  had  been  tracing 
his.  Even  as  he  explained  all  this,  my  mind  was  plung- 
ing into  projects  of  joint  sight-seeing.  And,  with  that, 
I  remembered  the  documents  from  the  Imperial  House- 
hold, which  I  had  thus  far  neglected  because  of  the  dul- 
ness  of  venturing  on  such  a  call,  alone  and  not  linguisti- 
cally aided. 


AN  UNINVITED  GUEST  OF  THE  MIKADO     197 

"Do  you  think,"  I  asked,  "that  you  can  pass  yourself 
off  as  a  Bishop?" 

It  seemed  rather  hopeless.  He  looked  fatally  young, 
and  there  was  something  secular  about  the  curl  of  his 
hair.  Moreover,  he  hesitated  to  involve  either  the 
Bishop  or  me  in  trouble  by  using  the  Bishop's  passes. 

"You  know  these  people  are  fanatics  on  the  subject 
of  their  emperor,"  he  said.  "They  won't  allow  his  sacred 
countenance  to  appear  on  stamps  or  postal  cards,  the 
way  the  British  use  the  phiz  of  old  King  George,  nor 
is  it  permitted  to  display  for  sale  anything  bearing  the 
imperial  crest.  There  are  all  sorts  of  quaint  instances 
of  suicides  among  menials  who  have  accidentally  broken 
some  of  the  taboos  that  hedge  the  Imperial  Person.  You 
don't  want  to  commit  suicide,  do  you,  as  a  reparation  for 
misusing  the  imperial  pass?  If  you  will  wait,  I  will 
get  one  of  these  things  for  myself." 

Kemembering  how  long  we  had  waited  for  these 
passes,  I  thought  I  should  be  gone  from  Kyoto  by  the 
time  his  arrived.  At  last  he  suggested  an  alternative. 
We  would  go  to  the  palace,  and  I  would  present  the 
whole  bunch  passes,  which  called  for  the  admission  of 
the  Bishop,  the  Bishop's  wife  and  daughter,  and  myself. 
At  the  same  time,  he  would  enter  with  me,  presenting 
no  pass,  and  register  by  his  proper  name,  and  simply 
trust  to  his  wits  to  prevent  the  guards  from  noticing  the 
irregularity.  If  they  chose  to  think  that  my  passes  ap- 
plied to  him,  that  was  their  affair.  There  would  be 
nothing  that  could  be  laid  either  to  the  Bishop  or  me, 
and  the  onus  would  be  on  the  Japanese  guards  for  not 
taking  advantage  of  his  honesty. 

Next  afternoon  we  rode  to  the  gates  of  one  of  the 
four  palaces  to  which  my  permits  admitted  me,  through 
the  pleasant  imperial  parks  where  the  Ohara  girls  were 


198  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

piling  the  new  mown  grass.  We  were  admited  by  polite 
guards  in  badly  fitting  Occidental  uniforms  and  ushered 
into  a  little  parlour  furnished  like  the  ante-room  to  a 
dentist's  office.  Here  we  were  invited  to  register,  while 
the  passes  I  tendered  were  carefully  scrutinized.  Syd- 
ney, the  guards  accepted  as  the  Bishop  without  question, 
not  requiring  the  prevarication  which  his  truthful  soul 
was  not  prepared  to  stoop  to.  But  they  could  not  deter- 
mine whether  I  was  the  Bishop's  wife  or  his  daughter, 
and  on  this  point  I  was  very  candid,  glad  to  practise  hon- 
esty somewhere.  Meanwhile  I  registered,  and  Sydney 
adroitly  placed  his  own  proper  name  beneath  mine,  and 
then,  with  his  hand  still  on  the  book,  poured  forth  a 
flood  of  eloquence  in  Japanese.  For  such  a  treat  the 
guards  were  evidently  not  prepared.  From  their 
struggle  with  English  they  fell  back  on  their  own  lan- 
guage with  relief,  talking  politely  all  at  once,  and,  no 
doubt,  enjoying  all  his  solecisms.  While  social  inter- 
course was  so  blithely  proceeding,  Sydney  closed  the 
book  and  escorted  them  out,  without  leaving  any  oppor- 
tunity to  compare  the  passes  and  the  registration. 

It  was  with  some  fear  and  trepidation  that  we  pro- 
ceeded around  the  lawns,  expecting  every  moment  that 
some  officious  pair  of  feet  would  come  scampering  after 
and  hale  us  to  justice.  The  palace  grounds  which  we 
had  thus  guilefully  entered  formed  a  pleasant  lawny 
estate,  with  interspersed  groves  and  water,  much  like  a 
college  campus. 

There  was  not  the  sombre  magnificence  of  the  Bud- 
dhist groves  and  crimson  courts,  nor  any  sense  of  old  his- 
toric splendour.  Before  the  Restoration  of  the  Emperor 
to  full  power  in  1868,  he  was  forced  by  the  conditions 
of  the  usurping  shogunate  to  live  frugally  and  without 
ostentation,  and  since  his  rise  to  a  supreme  and  unique 


AN  UNINVITED  GUEST  OF  THE  MIKADO     109 

position,  neither  the  tastes  and  artistic  capacity  of  the 
people  nor  the  resources  of  the  land  permit  of  the 
massive  building  and  ornate  decoration  of  the  grand 
imperialisms  of  China  or  Northern  India.  But  the  im- 
perial estates  were  charming  none  the  less,  fresh,  and 
pretty, and  green, and  the  buildings, with  their  beautiful, 
many-shingled  roofs,  and  stretches  of  clean  matting, 
and  paper  doors,  were,  in  the  Japanese  way,  pleasantly 
simple  and  homelike.  And  while  one  could  not  suppress 
a  slight  disappointment  that  this  palace  of  the  emperor 
seemed  scarcely  more  than  any  well-to-do  gentleman 
might  afford,  at  the  same  time  there  was  something  not 
displeasing  to  a  democratic  soul  in  all  this  simpleness— 
even  though  Sydney  assured  me  that  it  was  not  democ- 
racy that  dictated  it.  Only  the  big  hall  where  the  em- 
peror is  crowned,  with  its  vistas  of  great,  red  lacquered 
pillars,  and  fine  fresco  representing  the  Chinese  sages 
who  brought  learning  and  culture  to  Japan,  had  some- 
thing of  dignity  about  it. 

Sydney,  meanwhile,  was  still  practising  his  eloquence 
on  the  Japanese  guides  who  had  come  with  us,  nor  did 
he  let  them  escape,  till  we  were  safely  outside  the  im- 
perial portals.  There  remained  three  palaces  yet  to 
visit.  We  tried  one  more,  and  the  scheme  still  worked. 
Then  our  courage  failed,  and  we  determined  to  tamper 
no  more  with  the  Mikado's  hospitality.  Yet  withal,  we 
had  been  well-meaning  and  grateful  guests,  not  really 
unmindful  of  the  imperial  courtesy;  and  I  take  this 
opportunity  of  recording  my  apology  and  thanks  for  a 
pleasant  day. 

There  is  nothing  that  breaks  down  all  barriers  be- 
tween youth  like  being  partners  in  mischief,  and  joint 
enterprises  of  every  sort  thereafter  flourished  between 
us.  Of  the  full  story  of  the  next  two  weeks  there  is  no 


200  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

need  to  write.  The  interpretation  of  the  Japan  we  saw 
is  already  in  Sydney's  book,  and  my  observations  must 
yield  to  his  profounder  knowledge.  As  for  the  rest, 
there  are  few  who  cannot  fashion  the  story  themselves, 
if  not  out  of  memory,  at  least  out  of  hope.  But  in  one 
respect  our  experience  was  public  and  unique  and  de- 
serves a  chronicler,  if  only  to  warn  the  unwary : 
that  was  in  the  universal  chaperonage  of  Japanese 
maidenhood.  Fabulous  tales  have  gone  abroad  among 
Japanese  girls  of  the  ways  of  the  white  man  in  the 
presence  of  a  lady,  and  there  is  not  one  of  them  below 
the  ranks  in  which  breeding  suppresses  curiosity  who 
would  miss  a  good  chance  of  observation.  For  in  Japan 
the  social  attitudes  of  the  sexes  are  reversed.  It  is  the 
woman  who  carries  all  burdens,  who  yields  precedence 
to  the  man  in  passing  through  a  door,  who  performs  for 
her  lord  all  the  little  personal  services  which  a  gentle- 
man, in  our  country,  performs  for  a  lady. 

In  his  constant  and  instinctive  practice  of  all  the 
courtesies  that  the  western  gentleman  yields  to  a  lady, 
Sydney  is  notable  even  among  well-bred  Americans,  and 
it  was  not  long  before  his  manners  were  a  myth  among 
the  maidens.  When  we  went  forth  for  a  picnic,  Sydney 
laden  and  I  free-handed  despite  my  protests,  there  were 
the  giggling  Nesans  of  the  hotel  drawn  up  to  watch  this 
unnatural  procession.  Once,  in  the  courtyard  of  a  native 
inn,  where  we  stopped  for  rice,  tea,  and  a  vile  pickle  of 
fish,  Sydney  stepped  aside  to  let  me  enter  the  door  first. 
Forthwith  there  was  a  faint  ripple  of  mirth,  which  grew 
and  swelled  from  peep-hole  to  peep-hole  and  balcony  to 
balcony,  till  all  the  place  was  gay  with  the  mockery,  and 
even  the  proprietor  himself  came  out  to  laugh.  Some- 
times a  girl  would  seem  to  think  that  she  also  should 
share  in  this  mad  benevolence  of  foreign  men  to  her 


Beneath    the    towering    branches    that    make    so    rich    a    gloom 

against  the  sun,  blazes  the  scarlet  temple  where  a 

Shinto  priestess  will  dance 


Many  gods  and  ghosts  there  are  who  call  this  home 


There  was  not  the  sombre  magnificence  of  the 
Buddhist  interiors 


AN  UNINVITED  GUEST  OF  THE  MIKADO     iTOl 

Unworthy  sex.  As  we  walked  along  the  temple  path, 
two  or  three  would  clatter  up  on  their  clogs  behind  us, 
laughing,  and  teasing,  and  inviting  some  notice  on  their 
own  account.  And  there  was  one  sniffling  Xesan  who 
established  herself  next  to  us  at  lunch  in  a  Japanese 
inn,  giggling  and  blushing,  and  could  be  dislodged 
neither  by  hint  nor  persuasion. 

Nor  were  the  Japanese  girls  the  only  enthusiasts  in 
this  research.  The  young  Buddhist  monks  were  smil- 
ing pupils  when  some  more  saintly  elder  was  not  by,  and 
the  vendors  of  sweetmeats  were  quick  to  translate 
rumour  into  profit.  There  was  scarcely  a  woodland 
solitude  in  which  we  did  not  find  a  little  house  made 
ready,  it  seemed,  for  our  sole  coming,  and  tea  and  cakes 
prepared  by  some  officious  restaurateur.  This  repast 
he  would  spread  before  me,  having  heard  the  rumour 
and  learned  the  trick.  "Tea  for  Ochsan,"  he  would  an- 
nounce to  Sydney.  And  Sydney,  taking  advantage  of 
the  happy  suggestion,  would  translate :  "  He  says  this 
is  tea  for  my  wife." 

Into  the  midst  of  those  happy  days  darted  a  telegram 
from  the  Bishop.  I  had  been  quite  neglecting  my  usual 
communications  to  Dorothy,  and  he  had  grown  anxious 
in  consequence.  Would  I  join  him  at  once  at  Karui- 
zawa?  I  left  that  same  night  with  my  plans  for  the  fu- 
ture as  yet  unaltered.  The  next  evening,  after  some  delay 
in  Tokyo,  I  reached  the  top  of  the  mountain  at  Karui- 
zawa,  and  was  put  through  the  third  degree  by  Dorothy, 
eager,  curious,  and  romantically  suspicious.  Next  day 
was  my  birthday.  In  honour  of  the  day  the  kind  Bishop 
and  Lady  gave  me  a  dinner  in  the  little  dwelling  in  the 
woods  where  they  were  staying.  It  was  a  simple  build- 
ing, a  compromise  between  an  American  bungalow  and 
a  Japanese  house,  with  the  sliding  wooden  windows  of 


202  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  native  structures  which  serve  as  a  protection  against 
typhoons.  While  the  leaf-checkered  sunlight  was  flick- 
ering, undarkened,  across  our  dinner  table,  the  Bishop 
suddenly  averred  that  he  felt  a  typhoon  in  the  air,  and 
the  wooden  shutters  must  be  drawn.  I  protested  the 
innocence  of  the  pure  sunlight  without.  But  he  per- 
sisted, and,  rising  from  the  table,  himself  drew  most  of 
the  sliding  windows  to  till  we  were  shut  in  darkness. 

Suddenly  there  was  a  flash  and  shine,  and  "Cooksan," 
the  chef,  appeared,  bearing  an  enormous  birthday  cake, 
as  gay  with  lights  as  the  Milky  Way.  The  reason  for  the 
anxiety  to  darken  our  assemblage  was  now  obvious. 
Presenting  the  cake,  the  Bishop  made  a  speech  in  which 
he  congratulated  the  bride,  and  then  corrected  himself, 
and  said  he  had  forgot — it  was  only  a  birthday ;  and  was 
apologetic,  and  wondered,  with  twinkling  eyes,  how  he 
could  make  such  a  mistake.  Then  I  was  required,  with 
much  solemnity  and  ceremony,  to  put  my  knife  into  the 
foamy  white  structure,  and  make  a  secret  wish.  I  did 
so,  and  the  wish,  after  many  months  and  some  tribula- 
tions, was  granted. 

But  it  was  not  all  pure  merriment,  that  sojourn  on 
Karuizawa.  The  fourth  of  August  which  was  my  birth- 
day was  also  the  anniversary  of  the  entrance  of  Great 
Britian  into  the  war,  and  the  critical  period  of  the  Ger- 
man offensive.  The  day  came  as  a  reminder  of  great 
and  solemn  issues.  My  youth,  like  that  of  most  young 
people  who  had  come  to  maturity  at  that  time,  was 
pretty  well  shaped  to  that  war.  My  recreations  and  my 
work  had  both  been  of  its  texture,  and  there  was  scarcely 
an  incipient  courtship  across  which  its  shadow  had  not 
come.  Now  it  stood  squarely  and  darkly  across  every 
hope  and  purpose. 

Into  the  tangle  of  melancholy  and  puzzled  thinking 


AN  UNINVITED  GUEST  OF  THE  MIKADO     203 

came  a  letter  from  Sydney.  Would  I  see  him  in  Tokyo, 
when  I  came  down  from  Karuizawa?  Would  I  be  will- 
ing to  join  him  on  the  ascent  of  Fujiyama,  if  he  arranged 
it?  I  telegraphed,  "Yes."  In  Tokyo  I  found,  not  Syd- 
ney, as  yet,  but  another  letter. 

It  was  from  the  Diplomat.  He  had  come  to  Tokyo ;  he 
had  dined  there  on  August  1.  But  alas  for  the  perfidy  of 
the  feminine  heart — where  was  I?  Had  I  not  promised? 
And  the  rest  of  the  note  was  all  about  his  despair  and  his 
journey  to  England,  on  which  he  was  now,  no  doubt, 
safely  launched  by  way  of  the  Pacific,  with  a  multitude 
of  ladies  all  about  him  to  adore.  Thus  he  makes  his 
exit  from  my  story. 

With  the  evening  came  Sydney,  and  almost  at  the 
same  moment  an  occurrence  which  swept  away  all  pri- 
vate thought  for  a  time.  In  his  hand  he  still  clutched 
the  newspapers  in  which  he  had  been  trying  to  decipher 
the  truth  beneath  cryptic  notices  of  uprisings  all  over 
the  empire — in  Kobe,  in  Kyoto,  in  Osaka — among  the 
poor  because  the  price  of  rice  was  so  high.  At  dinner 
his  talk  still  circled  around  the  subject. 

Suddenly,  out  of  the  low  hum  of  the  hotel  dining-hall, 
rose  a  scream :  "It  is  a  revolution — ah,  yes.  So  it  be- 
gan in  Petrograd!  Mon  dieu!  Mon  dieu!  Wars,  wars! 
Revolutions !  As  in  Russia,  so  in  Japan." 

A  fugitive  Russian  countess  had  fallen  from  her  chair 
at  dinner,  fainting.  Outside  there  were  waves  upon 
waves  of  shouting.  Then  a  sharp,  musical  crash  as  a 
missive  went  through  one  of  our  own  windows  and  the 
broken  bits  in  falling  tinkled  against  stones. 

We  went  to  the  door.  The  hotel  boys  threw  them- 
selves in  our  way.  "Mustn't  go.  Not  safe.  Bad  people 
there."  The  Russians  corroborated.  Our  hotel,  they 
hysterically  proclaimed,  would  be  rushed  and  we  should 


204  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

all  be  murdered  before  morning  by  the  starving  prole- 
tariat. Walking  all  over  our  protesting  hotel-boys,  we 
stepped  out  into  the  garden. 

Around  the  garden  were  the  bars  of  an  iron  fence. 
Beyond  the  fence  we  looked  into  a  passionate  sea  of 
faces,  strangely  environed  and  guarded  by  ghostly  white 
figures  bearing  paper  lanterns.  It  was  like  a  scene  of 
sinister  enchantment.  They  could  not  seem  men  of  like 
passions  with  ourselves — those  myriads  of  kimonoed  fig- 
ures in  the  dimness,  swaying  with  a  restless  clank  and 
scrape  of  wooden  shoes.  They  had  appeared  like  a  skele- 
ton from  the  family  closet,  from  that  underworld  that 
lies  beneath  the  daintiness  of  Japan  like  mud  beneath 
a  lotus-pond.  And  there  they  stood — old  men  and  little 
girls  and  frowsy  women  of  the  eta — helpless  in  a  pas- 
sion of  dumb  protest.  And  all  about,  like  instruments 
of  sorcery,  floated  paper  lanterns,  adorned  with  dragons 
and  iris-flowers  and  fairy-tale  heroes.  Delicately  those 
lanterns  poised  above  them  and  shed  a  theatrical  glow 
on  myriads  of  eyes  that  burned  like  points  of  fire  in  the 
darkness. 

Then  we  saw  what  was  really  happening.  The  ghosts 
to  whom  the  lanterns  belonged  were  the  police,  in  their 
summer  garb  of  white.  The  people  were  attempting  to 
coalesce  and  form  for  concerted  action;  and  the  police 
were  trying  to  see  that  they  did  not. 

It  was  a  voiceless  crowd ;  there  was  an  ominous  hush, 
broken  only  by  a  snarl  of  rage  as  the  police  walked 
through  each  circling  eddy  of  people.  Silently  the 
crowd  shifted  like  a  troubled  sea.  Silently  the  police 
shifted — resolute,  disintegrating  little  bundles  of  en- 
ergy, ghostlike  in  their  white  garments,  their  lanterns 
glowing  like  dull  eyes  in  the  dark. 

The  mob  was   under   control.     Yet  one  wondered, 


AN  UNINVITED  GUEST  OF  THE  MIKADO     205 

"What  if  it  were  not!"  So  they  stayed  for  hours  iii  a 
kind  of  armed  truce — the  people  silent,  sullen,  inexplic- 
able centres  of  suppressed  passion,  shifting,  heaving; 
and  inter-penetrating  them,  binding  them,  the  still  force 
of  those  paper  lanterns. 

Sometimes  there  were  moments  of  rashness.  Auto- 
mobiles whirled  by  full  of  policemen — an  army  of  auto- 
mobiles— and  the  fury  of  the  crowd  broke  in  shrill 
shouting.  But  there  was  fear  even  in  that  shout,  and  a 
premonition  of  failure,  which  caused  it  to  die  helplessly 
away  in  silence.  So  it  lasted  far  into  the  night — the 
crowd,  the  truce,  the  glamour  of  enchaining  lanterns. 

Next  morning  the  papers  merely  announced  that  a 
riot  in  front  of  the  Imperial  Hotel  in  Tokyo  had  been 
suppressed. 


CHAPTEE  XXV 

PILGRIMS  AMONG  THE  STARS 

OUT  of  a  world  so  troubled  we  escaped  into  the  peace  of 
Fujiyama.  Between  us  still  trembled  a  question  unan- 
swered. Those  who  bear  about  in  their  most  secret 
minds  the  picture  of  some  one  place — a  fireside,  per- 
haps, or  sands  by  a  moonlit  sea,  or  some  humble  and 
common  spot  that  borrowed  once  a  grace  from  love — 
must  read  their  own  memories  into  the  tale  of  this,  our 
pilgrimage  among  the  stars. 

We  had  determined  to  climb  Fujiyama  by  night.  It 
had  been  Sydney's  most  cherished  plan,  the  climax  of 
the  chivalrous  quest  of  the  summer.  Such  journeys 
are  not  made  without  escort  and  chaperonage,  but  why 
speak  of  that?  For  us  there  were  only  two  upon  that 
path  to  the  sky,  and  the  night  and  the  clouds  made  their 
own  privacy.  Leaving  the  plains  as  the  sun  drew  near 
to  the  foot  of  the  mountain,  we  clambered  upward  over 
the  slopes  into  the  sunset.  And  before  night  had  come 
upon  us  the  trees  had  already  begun  to  fall  away  below 
us,  and  the  cool  mists  enwrapped  us  softly.  Before 
us  stretched  a  world  of  ashes,  memorials  of  volcanic 
passion  long  spent,  desolate,  silent,  with  the  silence  of 
dead  places.  Infinitely  soothing  was  the  great  empti- 
ness, the  coolness,  the  soundlessness.  There  was  only  the 
sound  of  our  coolie's  feet,  a  very  little  sound,  crushing 
into  the  ash.  We  could  not  see  the  sky,  for  the  cold 
mists  came  down  and  veiled  it ;  nor  the  world  below,  for 

206 


PILGRIMS  AMONG  THE  STARS  207 

the  cold  mists  rose  and  wrapped  it  from  our  eyes.  It 
was  like  the  limbo  of  lost  spirits,  whom  earth,  and 
heaven,  and  hell  have  all  refused,  and  they  hang  forever 
between  the  upper  and  nether  spaces. 

So  we  climbed  Fuji  in  the  twilight.  The  mist  seemed 
to  blush  a  little  around  us,  and  we  saw  dimly  some  far- 
off  streak  of  pink  sky.  This  we  knew  was  sunset.  Up 
and  up  we  went,  putting  cloud  after  cloud  beneath  us. 
They  fell  away  and  drifted  below  over  the  hidden  world. 
Sometimes  the  figures  of  Japanese  pilgrims  loomed 
through  the  mist,  great  and  ghostly,  and  their  voices 
came  to  us,  disembodied  and  vagrant  voices,  sounding 
a  little  hollow  in  that  lonely  place. 

Then  suddenly  the  mountain  sprang  up  like  a  wall, 
sheer  and  black  into  a  silvery  green  sky ;  and  the  moon 
rode  forth.  Far  below  the  clouds  billowed  like  a  sea, 
gleaming  and  flashing.  Above  there  was  only  the  in- 
finite clarity  of  pure  space,  cloudless,  star- filled ;  around 
us  a  wilderness  of  ash.  We  were  alone  in  the  presence 
of  the  night  that  is  above  the  lower  sky. 

We  climbed  through  the  darkness.  Above  us  gleamed 
the  chain  of  rest-stations.  Feeble,  little  red  stars  of 
light,  they  were  set  like  rubies  on  the  forehead  of  the 
mountain.  Far  below  we  could  hear  singing.  It  was  the 
voices  of  Japanese  soldiers  climbing  all  together  and 
singing  through  the  night.  Sometimes  a  friendly  greet- 
ing came  to  us  out  of  the  distance;  sometimes  a  white- 
robed  pilgrim  crossed  our  path  like  a  ghost. 

As  we  climbed  the  air  grew  sharper,  and  sometimes, 
in  a  hollow  place,  the  cold  wind  from  the  heights 
rushed  down  upon  us,  roaring.  I  was  weary  and  lay 
down  upon  the  ashy  side  of  the  mountain.  It  was  very 
soft  and  still  warm  with  the  heat  of  the  sun.  As  I  lay 
there  above  the  world,  looking  into  the  vast  sky,  it 


208  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

seemed  as  if  I  could  almost  feel  the  earth  whirling 
through  space,  with  a  faint  singing  sound. 

As  the  moon  waned,  the  shadowy  wall  of  the  mountain 
grew  black  and  terrible.  At  last  the  moonshine  vanished 
in  a  pale  gleam  beyond  the  hill,  and  on  those  heights 
above  the  clouds,  in  that  desert  of  ash,  the  darkness 
fell  round  us  solemnly.  In  the  darkness  the  wind  seemed 
to  rise,  howling  and  whistling  and  darting  upon  us  out 
of  fathomless  space. 

We  came  to  a  rest-station  built  solidly  of  great  rocks 
against  the  hill.  On  these  heights  no  frailer  stuff  could 
resist  the  wind.  Wearily  we  stumbled  in.  It  was  full 
of  a  warm  smoky  glow  of  light.  All  round  men  wrapped 
in  blankets  were  sleeping.  A  little  Japanese  squatting 
over  a  bowl  of  coals  made  us  tea.  Our  guide  fell  at  our 
feet  and  snored.  Outside  the  wind  howled  and  snarled. 
It  was  warm,  cosy ;  and  there  was  comfort  in  the  near- 
ness of  the  warm,  breathing,  human  flesh  even  of  these 
unknown  sleepers.  So  we  rested. 

I  awoke  in  the  first  light  of  morning,  to  find  Sydney 
already  heralding  the  dawn.  Detaching  ourselves  by 
signs  and  whispers  from  the  still  drowsy  shelter,  we 
slipped  out  together  into  the  heart  of  the  glowing 
heavens.  As  we  stepped  upon  the  rocky,  wind-beaten 
ledge,  the  great  world  seemed  to  open  beneath  us, 
like  Dante's  own  rose  of  Paradise.  Above,  the  sky 
was  shining ;  below,  the  mists  rolled  away  in  billows  and 
promontories  and  peaks  of  snow,  a  crystalline,  ephem- 
eral world,  changing,  moving,  smoke-grey  and  pearly 
white.  Sometimes  the  clouds  broke  a  little,  and  showed 
glimpses  of  fields  and  hills,  like  things  seen  at  the  bot- 
tom of  a  lake,  indistinctly,  through  a  shimmer  of  water. 
Suddenly  the  mists  billowed  like  the  waves  of  the  ocean 
into  crests  of  flame,  and  the  sun  rose.  Beyond  the  mists 


Fabulous  tales  of  the  ways  of  the  white  man  in  the  presence 
of  a  lady  had  gone  abroad 


There  was  not  one  who  would  miss  a  good  chance 
for  observation 


PILGRIMS  AMONG  THE  STARS  209 

was  a  smooth  clear  sheet  of  light,  whereon  the  clouds 
rested  like  islands.  It  was  the  sea!  And  out  of  that 
high  and  lonely  dawn  that  blazes  every  morning  be- 
yond the  lower  clouds  for  no  eyes  to  see,  there  stole 
into  our  two  hearts  the  music  and  words  of  a  poem 
which  I  had  learned  in  childhood,  and  from  whose 
melody  I  had  never  till  then  extracted  a  meaning: 

The  Sabbaths  of  eternity, 

One  Sabbath  deep  and  wide — 
A  light  upon  the  shining  sea, 

The  bridegroom  with  his  bride. 

Behind  us  rose  the  cone  of  Fugi  unconquered  still, 
and  before  that  second  ascent,  our  creature  appetites 
asserted  themselves  through  the  ecstasy  of  the  morn- 
ing, and  cried  out  against  hunger  and  lameness  and  the 
endless  struggle  for  breath.  In  the  morning  light  the 
mountain  looked  garish  and  ugly.  The  truthful  sun, 
less  kindly  than  the  darkness,  shone  pitilessly  on  cin- 
ders and  ash,  and  the  scars  of  ancient  fire.  The  pil- 
grims whose  presence  in  the  night  upon  the  empty 
slopes  of  the  mountain  had  seemed  only  some  visionary 
companionship  upon  the  further  shores  of  space  had  now 
become  bands  of  riotous  Japanese  pilgrims  no  more 
poetic  than  the  crowds  of  Coney  Island.  All  the  several 
lines  of  them,  so  widely  scattered  at  the  base,  were  now 
converging  upon  the  summit.  For  the  top  of  Fujiyama 
is  a  famous  Shinto  shrine,  the  peculiar  and  favourite 
seat  of  that  sacred  spirit  of  this  land  which  is  believed 
to  be  the  inner  life  of  its  natural  phenomena,  and  the 
soul  of  the  people,  and  to  be  incarnate  on  earth  in  the 
Emperor.  A  simple  belief  and  very  near  to  the  prim- 
itive— innocent  enough  to  all  seeming,  and  not  unim- 


210  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

pressive;  yet  capable  of  the  same  jingoistic  uses  that 
made  the  aspirations  of  Kultur  anathema.  However 
this  may  be,  the  pious  Japanese  adds  merit  to  his  ac- 
count in  the  other  world  by  homage  upon  these  heights, 
and  enjoys  the  excursion  and  the  picnic  of  it  as  his 
earthly  reward.  All  over  the  heights  the  pilgrims  were 
now  clambering.  Some,  their  devotions  ended,  like  boys 
on  a  toboggan  slide,  were  shooting  down  the  slopes  of 
ash. 

All  morning  we  climbed.  The  sun  was  hot  and  the  air 
was  cold,  and  there  was  nothing  at  all  to  breathe.  The 
cinders  moved  under  our  feet  and  sometimes  rolled  clink- 
ing down  the  mountain. 

At  noon  we  came  to  the  top,  over  the  last  rock.  There 
lay  the  crater  before  us  like  an  enlarged  dump-hole. 
There  was  a  little  discoloured  snow  in  it,  not  worth  the 
seeing.  There  was  a  torii  and  a  little  shrine.  Was  this 
all?  Had  we  come  for  this?  We  looked  below.  Fairy- 
land wras  behind  us!  Beautiful  as  a  dream  the  world 
glimmered  through  the  clouds — green  slopes  of  hills 
and  shining  sea;  and  over  it  all,  like  the  moving  face  of 
waters,  the  glory  of  sun  and  cloud,  shifting,  flashing, 
vast  and  delicate.  It  seemed  but  an  illusion,  that  world 
— hard  to  believe  in — a  vision  of  fleeting  grace,  a  light 
that  would  go  out  in  darkness. 

Sitting  on  a  black  rock  in  the  midst  of  the  infinite 
heaven,  throned  like  a  god  above  the  world,  I  proceeded 
to  philosophize. 

But  Sydney  interrupted.  He  had  been  rummaging  in 
the  little  rest-house  and  had  unearthed — a  can  of  pine- 
apple! It  reminded  our  parched  lips  of  blessings  that 
are  not  found  above  the  clouds.  Our  thoughts  turned 
earthward.  £  ;  "1 

All  afternoon  we  sought  the  reality  beneath  the  deli- 


PILGRIMS  AMONG  THE  STABS  211 

cate  and  glittering  illusion  of  the  world  that  shimmered 
below  us.  Sliding  at  break-neck  pace  down  that  wall 
of  ash,  we  dropped  once  more  into  the  clouds. 

As  we  came  down  into  a  land  of  solid  things — trees 
and  houses  and  lumbering  Japanese  horses — a  cold  mist 
came  up  from  the  sea  and  wrapped  us  about,  sprinkling 
our  hair  and  faces  with  drops  of  dew.  Its  touch  was 
sweet  upon  our  weary  flesh.  Aching,  sun-burned,  and 
tired,  yet  joyfully  perched  on  the  pyramidical  backs  of 
two  melancholy  steeds,  singing  old  love  songs  together, 
we  rode  in  the  grey  ghostly  twilight  through  the  green 
woodland  lanes.  After  the  desolation  of  ash  and  the 
empty  heights  above  the  world,  the  presence  of  green 
leaves,  the  fragrance  of  growing  things,  and  the  trickle 
of  unseen  waters  were  sweet,  and  the  mist  and  the  faint 
tree  shadows  fell  on  us  like  a  caress. 

Thereafter,  for  days,  all  green  and  simple  things  shone 
with  a  radiance  of  freshness.  It  was  as  if  we  had  never 
seen  the  world  before.  Our  sight  was  purged  and  we 
saw  with  eyes  of  men  new-born. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

A  PERSONAL  EPILOGUE 

IT  seems  an  imposition  to  bother  any  reader  with  the 
personal  and  private  details  of  an  experience  whose  only 
claim  upon  another's  mind  lies  in  such  elements  of  it  as 
are  poetic  and  universal.  Yet  it  seems  that  I  can 
scarcely  get  on  with  my  story  without  some  further  ex- 
planation. 

"Dear  Mother,"  I  wrote  the  morning  after  our  return 
from  Fujiyama,  enclosing  a  snap-shot,  "I  hope  you  like 
him,  for  he  is  to  be  my  husband." 

A  blithe  promise,  indeed,  but  greatly  weighted  and 
shadowed  in  the  prospects  of  its  fulfilment!  For 
Sydney  could  not  leave  Japan  till  the  following  June, 
and  my  presence  was  imperatively  required  at  home  in 
the  autumn  to  undertake  responsibilities  I  thought  I 
could  place  on  no  one  else.  Moreover  it  seemed  certain 
that,  before  June,  Sydney  must  be  swept  into  the 
struggle,  perhaps  by  way  of  Siberia.  And  how,  beyond 
that  welter  of  blood  which  still  seemed  boundless  and 
eternal,  were  we  to  find  each  other  again,  and  a  wholly 
private  peace? 

Still,  if  I  could  put  off  a  little  the  day  of  my  return,  it 
might  be  that  Sydney  would  be  called  to  the  front  sooner 
than  he  thought  and  would  come  back  with  me.  It  might 
be — but  when  my  reflections  reached  this  point,  there 
arrived  a  letter  from  Dorothy  announcing  that  the 
Bishop  was  called  to  Sechuen  province  in  Western 
China,  which  meant  a  month's  journey  by  house-boat  up 

212 


A  PERSONAL  EPILOGUE  213 

the  Yangtse  gorges.  They  could  not  sail  till  November. 
What  would.  I  do?  Could  I  wait?  Could  I  come?  I 
wrote  her  of  my  ultimate  intentions  and  received  a  letter 
by  return  mail,  all  underscored,  announcing  that,  on  the 
receipt  of  The  News,  she  had  "wept  quarts,"  and  was 
ever  so  glad,  and  would  like  to  hug  me  to  pieces,  and 
meanwhile  she  enclosed  a  note  to  Sydney  which  I  might 
read  if  I  was  going  to  be  "that  sort  of  wife."  Of  course 
I  delivered  it,  without  reading,  but  was  favoured  with  a 
peep  at  it  afterwards.  It  was  a  warm-hearted  and  lov- 
ing letter  for  "dear  Sydneysan,"  containing  a  complete 
record  of  my  virtues. 

Though  I  had  no  intention  of  detaching  myself  from 
my  duties  at  home  which  were  much  on  my  conscience, 
I  finally  wrote  for  advice  and  full  information,  asking 
for  a  reply  by  cable  to  Manila,  all  private  cable  con- 
nections between  Japan  and  America  being  at  that  time 
impossible.  The  next  thing  to  do  was  to  start  off  in  the 
direction  of  Manila  to  get  that  swift  answer.  It  was  to 
be  a  brief  excursion,  for  practical  purposes  only,  and  I 
said  good-bye  to  Sydney  cheerfully,  like  one  off  for  a 
week-end,  with  promises  to  straighten  out  my  affairs  ac- 
cording to  his  wishes  with  the  blessed  help  of  the  Amer- 
ican cable,  and  to  return,  if  not  to  a  wedding,  at  least 
with  a  definite  promise. 

So  one  silvery  midnight  I  slipped  out  of  Kobe,  over 
the  fiery  little  waves  of  a  moonlit  sea.  Behind  me 
Sydney's  white  tropical  garb,  and  the  little  boat  in  which 
he  had  come  out  to  the  ship  to  say  good-bye,  melted  like 
spiritual  essences  into  the  snowy  radiance  of  the  night. 
How  often,  in  the  months  that  followed,  when  all  the 
seas  of  the  world  tossed  between  me  and  my  hopes,  and 
every  day  tangled  and  snarled  anew  the  slender  thread 
that  bound  me  to  those  silvered  shores — how  often  I 


214  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

pictured  it  again,  the  sea,  and  the  sky  gay  with  stars, 
and  the  little  boat  and  the  white  form  therein,  and  all 
the  hopeful  parting  in  the  moonlight,  and  the  plans  and 
pledges  that  time  turned  to  irony. 


BOOK  FOUR 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

PERCY,   THE   PLUTOCRAT 

I  DID  not  try  to  make  friends  on  board,  having  myself 
too  much  to  plan  and  to  remember.  It  was  enough  to 
sit  by  the  hour,  alone  and  idle,  with  the  tropical  sea 
swinging  quietly  beneath  me.  Smooth  and  blue  and 
languid  was  that  sea,  shining  like  silk  beneath  the  shin- 
ing sky,  a  mirror  for  dreams  and  a  canvas  for  fancy. 
Great  clouds  touched  with  grey  and  amber  slept  upon 
the  horizon,  and  the  water  heaved  idly,  and  the  boat 
moved  like  a  lazy  thing,  as  if  it  could  scarcely  lift  itself 
through  the  weight  of  water. 

The  passengers  were,  as  usual,  pretty  well  divided  be- 
tween the  missionaries  and  the  poker  players.  Here  and 
there  a  single  individual  lounged  lonesomely  about,  seek- 
ing distraction  that  would  steer  a  safe  course  between 
the  sheep  and  the  goats.  One  of  these  was  the  Younger 
Son.  He  was  a  lanky,  pleasant,  futile  sort  of  English- 
man, who  lived  on  a  remittance  from  home  and  spent 
his  days  trying  to  devise  means  of  enlarging  it  without 
losing  caste. 

His  name  I  recognized  at  once,  for  I  had  known  his 
wife  in  Japan.  So  when  he  came  along  and  detached 
me  from  a  band  of  missionaries,  whispering,  "Come  with 
me.  You  look  like  the  devil  among  the  angels,"  I  hailed 
him  as  a  friend ;  for  he  was,  in  his  idle  way,  a  good  sort, 
well  read,  well  bred,  and  entertaining. 

His  chief  function  in  the  plot  of  my  story  is  that  he 

217 


218  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

introduced  Percy,  the  Plutocrat.  Percy  had  a  luxurious 
suite  on  board  and  was  fabled  to  be  enormously  rich. 
He  was  a  slim,  blonde  Englishman,  with  keen  grey  eyes 
and  a  manner  alternately  bored  and  intense.  He  spent 
his  day  before  the  shelves  of  books  in  the  writing-room. 
Beginning  at  the  top  shelf,  he  was  reading  to  the  bottom 
at  the  rate  of  about  ten  books  a  day.  Once  or  twice 
he  separated  himself  from  these  literary  pursuits  long 
enough  to  join  the  Younger  Son  and  me  in  a  promenade 
around  the  deck,  on  which  occasions  he  said  nothing. 
Now  and  then  he  would  deposit  himself  in  a  steamer- 
chair  next  to  mine,  and  watch  me  with  eyes  in  which 
keenness  gave  away  to  brooding.  But  to  all  my  efforts 
to  be  sociable  he  remained  immune. 

"All  is  not  gold  that  glitters,"  I  remarked  to  the 
Younger  Son.  "But  I  must  say  that  his  gold  is  the  only 
brilliant  thing  about  your  friend  the  Plutocrat." 

"Oh,  you  don't  understand  him  yet,"  he  answered. 
"He's  got  something  on  his  mind — a  girl,  I  fancy.  He 
is  really  a  remarkable  chap,  quite  amazing." 

At  this  point  the  Plutocrat  joined  us  and  took  the 
chair  on  the  other  side  of  me.  He  and  the  Younger  Son 
began  a  discussion  of  the  love-story  in  a  novel  they  were 
reading,  talking  back  and  forth  across  me.  The  Younger 
Son  was  inclined  to  put  on  airs.  On  such  occasions  he 
always  wore  that  look  of  profound  and  secret  wisdom 
which  matrimony  seems  to  confer  on  some  people. 

"Take  my  word  for  it,  old  chap,"  said  he.  "A  bachelor 
never  understands  these  things.  Wait  till  you're 
married." 

"Married !"  The  word  seemed  to  galvanize  Percy  into 
life.  He  jumped  up  and  began  to  pace  back  and  forth. 
"Married — what  do  you  mean  by  married?" 

"Oh,  come  now,  Percy.    Marriage  is  marriage,"  said 


PERCY,  THE  PLUTOCRAT  219 

the  Younger  Son,  laughing  a  little  as  if  to  ward  off  a 
scene. 

"And  do  you  really  think  you  know  what  marriage 
is — what  heaven  and  hell  and  utter  torture  it  can  be 
under  our  British  system  of  caste  and  society?" 

His  words  were  coming  now  in  a  passionate  torrent. 
"Suppose  you  have  a  lot — money,  position,  and  all  that, 
and  ambition.  You've  got  to  marry  up  to  it,  especially 
if  you  have  political  aspirations.  And  all  the  while 
there's  a  girl.  She  hasn't  any  money,  isn't  anybody, 
you  know — quite  out  of  your  set  or  class  or  whatever 
you  call  it.  She  lives  in  shabby  little  rooms  of  her  own. 
You  don't  know  how  it  happened,  but  that  place  is 
home  to  you.  It's  not  passion — understand !  There  was 
passion  once,  but  it's  all  burnt  out,  and  in  its  place 
has  come  kindness  and  a  habit  deep  as  life.  Your 
life  is  no  longer  your  own.  You  think,  you  feel,  you 
act,  in  terms  of  her.  When  you  think,  you  are  only 
holding  mental  conversations  with  her.  When  you  feel, 
you  see  your  heart  reflected  in  her  face.  Another  per- 
sonality lives  in  your  blood,  moves  in  your  soul.  She's 
getting  old  and  thin ;  all  the  prettiness  you  cared  about 
once  is  worn  out.  But  you  don't  care.  She's  the  book 
in  which  the  history  of  your  youth  is  written — the  hopes, 
the  rapture,  the  passion ;  all  its  misery,  repentance,  and 
failure.  She  knows  everything  about  you  and  under- 
stands. You  know  if  you  came  to  her  door  penniless, 
disgraced,  or  drunk — she'd  take  you  in.  She  is  the  only 
person  in  the  world  before  whom  you  could  break  down 
and  weep  and  not  be  ashamed. 

"Then  the  time  comes  when  you  say  to  yourself:  'I 
must  get  married.  I  must  stand  for  Parliament.  I  must 
found  a  family  and  leave  my  fortune  to  a  son.'  And  you 
look  around  for  what  the  world  calls  a  wife.  You  give 


220  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

her  up.  And  it  is  like  slow  suicide,  a  daily  rending  of 
your  whole  self,  fibre  from  fibre,  nerve  from  nerve,  flesh 
from  flesh.  You  walk  the  streets  to  keep  from  going 
to  her.  You  read  book  after  book  to  keep — " 

He  stopped  suddenly  and  ended  coldly :  "There  may 
not  be  priest  or  bell  or  book  there,  but  I  tell  you  that 
is  marriage."  Dead  silence  fell.  The  Younger  Son 
looked  embarrassed.  Percy  walked  back  and  forth. 
Fearing  lest  he  should  be  regretting  his  outburst,  I  spoke 
of  the  book  in  his  hand,  and  the  conversation  gradually 
slipped  into  more  ordinary  channels.  But  it  remained 
a  dialogue  between  the  two  men.  When  I  rose  to  say 
good-night,  I  said:  "I  am  afraid  I  have  contributed 
little  to  the  conversation  to-night." 

Percy  looked  at  me  gravely.  "I  have  been  talking  to 
you  all  evening,"  he  said. 

After  that  a  strange  friendship  sprang  up  between  us, 
at  once  formal  and  intimate.  I  first  saw  Manila  over  the 
walls  his  wealth  built  around  me,  before  I  graduated 
from  the  plutocracy  into  the  society  of  the  pygmies,  and 
the  most  primitive  life  I  knew  in  all  my  wanderings. 

A  day  or  two  later  we  came  into  Manila.  All  morn- 
ing we  had  been  gliding  through  warm  rains  along  the 
shores  of  lonely  and  verdant  islands.  About  two  o'clock 
we  came  to  anchor  in  that  beautiful  harbour  over  which 
America  still  claims  a  protectorate.  Through  a  sheet  of 
rain  I  looked  forth  on  those  low  green  shores  with  a 
warm  sense  of  homecoming.  A  street-car  grinding 
busily  away  into  the  wet  shadow  of  palms,  the  dome  of 
an  old  Spanish  church,  a  blur  and  blot  of  rain — that  was 
Manila.  Around  us  on  the  rain-beaten  waters  lay 
schooners  and  gunboats,  and  through  the  mist  the  red 
bars  of  the  American  flag  gleamed  softly. 

The  boat  had  come  alongside  the  pier,  and  out  of  the 


PERCY,  THE  PLUTOCRAT  221 

babel  of  voices  rose  accents  long  since  grown  strange 
to  me,  but  potent  to  stir  old  memories  of  home.  The 
American  accent!  I  knew  now  what  the  British  meant 
by  that  phrase.  It  was  strange  to  hear  one's  own  lan- 
guage almost  as  a  foreign  tongue;  for  in  the  Orient  even 
Americans  quickly  fall  into  the  British  way  of  talking, 
and  only  the  Philippines  maintain  our  speech  in  its  na- 
tive purity.  But  all  around  me  now  were  American  faces 
—real  Americans  who  had  come  directly  to  the  islands 
on  American  transports  years  ago  and  were  as  blissfully 
ignorant  of  the  social  and  linguistic  usages  of  peoples 
not  ruled  by  Uncle  Sam  as  they  might  have  been  in  their 
own  little  towns  back  home.  Their  nasal,  humorous, 
unpolished  speech  was  deliciously  reminiscent  of  Ohio 
and  Indiana.  The  old  dock-hand  looked  like  a  ferry -man 
on  the  Hudson ;  and  the  man  with  the  Filipino  passport- 
agent  talked  like  the  keeper  of  a  general  store  in  a  small 
Connecticut  village.  After  my  sojourn  among  the  Brit- 
ish, the  manners  of  these  Americans  struck  me  as  just  a 
little  rude,  yet  immensely  kind  and  homelike. 

The  whole  afternoon  was  consumed  in  the  vexations 
of  landing.  As  I  waited  for  my  share  of  the  attentions 
of  the  passport-agent,  I  wondered  where  Percy  was,  and 
whether  I  should  ever  see  him  again.  He  was  going  on 
to  Hongkong,  I  knew.  He  himself  interrupted  this 
revery. 

"What  can  I  do  for  you?"  he  asked.  "The  ship  is  in 
harbour  for  several  days,  and  I  have  rooms  at  the  Manila 
Hotel." 

"I  have  a  room  there,  too,"  I  replied,  " — at  least,  until 
I  receive  an  offer  of  other  hospitality." 

He  looked  thoughtful,  and  walked  away  with  an  air 
of  self-absorption.  Later  he  returned. 

"I  have  a  motor-car  outside,"  he  said.    "It  will  take 


222  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

you  up  to  the  hotel  as  soon  as  you  can  extricate  yourself 
here." 

"Are  you  coming?"  I  asked. 

"No,  I  have  decided  to  stay  on  shipboard." 

I  suppose  I  looked  surprised.  He  went  on :  "I'd  like 
to  see  a  bit  of  you  while  I  am  here,  dining  and  motoring 
and  all  that.  I  thought,  since  you  are  alone,  you  might 
feel  it  embarrassing  to  be  seen  with  me  if  I  were  staying 
at  the  hotel  too.  And  I  suppose  you'd  rather  not  arrive 
with  me,  either.  So  go  along  in  the  motor-car,  and  I'll 
find  my  way  around  there  and  dine  with  you  if  I  may." 

It  was  the  kind  of  delicacy  that  one  could  expect  only 
from  a  sophisticated  person.  But  I  appreciated  the  fact 
that,  in  his  own  self-conscious  fashion,  he  was  playing 
the  part  of  a  gentleman. 

After  dinner  at  the  hotel  we  found  the  Younger  Son 
and  a  dowager,  and  went  out  to  see  Manila  at  night. 
As  we  sped  along  through  the  damp  and  fragrant  dark- 
ness, the  city  seemed  to  me  a  little  like  New  Orleans, 
with  its  old  Spanish  houses,  its  palms  and  mossy  walls 
and  tangled  gardens.  We  saw  it  all  by  flashes  and  circles 
of  light,  each  separate  picture  framed  in  the  illumina- 
tion of  the  street  lamps.  Sometimes  the  pillars  and 
closed  shutters  of  a  Spanish  house,  sometimes  the  walls 
of  a  cathedral,  fortresslike  save  for  the  stone  hands  of 
Jesus  reaching  out  to  us  from  the  darkness ;  then  a  quick 
lunch  counter ;  a  department  store ;  a  khaki-clad  figure ; 
and  again  a  Senorita's  brown  head  framed  in  gauze. 
So  they  passed. 

But  the  chauffeur  had  been  tipped,  as  chauffeurs  in 
those  foreign  ports  are  likely  to  be.  The  gentlemen  were 
not  to  be  allowed  to  take  the  ladies  back  to  the  hotel 
without  leaving  some  one  the  richer.  The  car  stopped 
before  a  pavilion  glowing  with  lights  like  the  starry 


PERCY,  THE  PLUTOCRAT  223 

heavens  and  throbbing  with  music.  Would  we  dance? 
Surely  the  ladies  wished  to  dance! 

"That  all  depends,"  said  Percy  cautiously.  "Let  us 
look  at  the  dance." 

The  chauffeur  assured  us  that  it  was  most  respectable. 
The  most  delicate-minded  ladies  frequented  this  won- 
derful place.  In  fact,  only  the  elite  of  Manila  society 
ventured  to  come  here.  His  manner  implied  that  his 
exhortations  were  a  social  honour  which  we  could  not 
ignore. 

We  were  helped  out  by  a  round  little  fellow  in  brown 
and  scarlet  livery,  with  a  cap  set  at  a  humorous  angle 
above  his  grin.  The  dancing  pavilion  was  divided  into 
two  parts — the  white  side  and  the  brown  side.  These 
were  separated  by  a  wall  of  odd-looking  horticulture 
in  the  shape  of  palms  budding  and  blossoming  with  arti- 
ficial cherry  blossoms.  The  white  side  was  a  harmless- 
looking  cabaret.  The  brown  side  was  more  mysterious. 
On  one  side  under  a  gallery  sat  white  men  drinking 
at  little  tables.  On  the  opposite  side  sat  demure  little 
Filipino  maidens  in  rows,  dressed  in  cheap,  girlish  eve- 
ning frocks,  like  schoolgirls  at  a  country  party. 

The  music  squeaked,  wailed,  and  burst  into  tune  and 
form.  At  once  the  white  men  at  the  table  sprang  up. 
Each  advanced  to  some  little  brown  maiden  and  the 
dancing  began.  The  girls  were  very  slim,  with  dainty 
waists  and  trim  ankles.  They  walked  and  danced  with 
a  curious  swagger,  not  voluptuous  exactly,  yet  not  lack- 
ing in  hints  of  savage  abandon.  It  was  not  revolting, 
like  the  dancing  of  one  or  two  soft,  painted,  white  women 
who  strayed  into  the  "respectable"  side  of  the  cabaret. 
The  movement  of  those  lithe  brown  creatures  had  the 
grace  and  naturalness  of  wild  animals,  with  a  swing 
of  the  hips  and  a  twist  of  the  waist  whose  sensual  art 


224  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  Western  girl  has  lost.  Yet  certainly  it  was  not  moral 
dancing.  There  was  something  shameless  and  exciting 
about  it. 

The  little  dancers  had  shy  and  childlike  ways.  There 
was  no  familiarity,  almost  no  flirting.  They  glanced 
only  now  and  then  at  their  partners,  furtively,  bash- 
fully. When  the  dance  was  over,  each  man  left  twenty 
centavos  or  more  in  his  partner's  hand.  Of  this  the  girls 
deposited  ten  centavos  at  the  cash-window.  Beyond 
ten  centavos  for  each  dance  the  spoils  were  theirs.  Then 
they  scurried  back  to  their  places,  awaiting  with  down- 
cast eyes  and  folded  hands  the  invitation  of  the  next 
man. 

Afterwards  I  learned  that  there  are  several  places  of 
this  sort  in  Manila,  of  a  somewhat  indeterminate  moral 
character.  This  one,  the  most  gorgeous  of  them  all,  was 
later  closed,  I  believe,  through  the  efforts  of  the  Y.  M. 
C.  A.  and  of  white  women  who  said  that  girls  had  been 
lured  to  dance  there,  in  its  respectable  area,  under  false 
pretences. 

Next  day  Percy  said  that  he  was  really  going  to  show 
me  Manila.  To  this  end  he  dismissed  my  galesa — a  lei- 
surely Filipino  carriage  drawn  by  somnambulant  beasts 
— and  whirled  me  off  in  a  motor-car.  All  afternoon  we 
careered  along  the  edge  of  the  speed  limit,  among  great 
water-buffalo  whose  spreading  horns  blocked  all  passage, 
through  narrow  streets,  beneath  stone  saints  whose  gar- 
ments had  become  gardens  for  the  wind-blown  seeds  of 
flowers,  past  an  old  graveyard,  dank  and  heavily  green, 
where  bones  of  men  long  dead  were  hid  away  in  crypts 
one  above  another,  and  were  now  sewed  and  sealed  with 
the  tendrils  of  moss — after  which  he  deposited  me  at  the 
hotel  with  an  air  of  satisfaction.  He  had  now  shown 
me  the  town,  and  a  fine  confusion  it  was  in  my  mind. 


PERCY,  THE  PLUTOCRAT  225 

The  only  outstanding  moments  in  this  rapid  demonstra- 
tion were  those  in  which  we  tiptoed  into  the  ward  of  a 
mission  hospital  for  women  and  children.  Why  he  chose 
to  include  this  in  the  sight-seeing  I  do  not  know.  He 
merely  remarked :  "I  suppose  I  shall  die  some  day,  and 
compound  for  my  sins  by  leaving  money  to  one  of  these 
things." 

The  children  were  a  spectacle  to  extract  gold  from  a 
miser.  Most  of  them  were  simply  suffering  from  starva- 
tion as  a  result  of  their  parents'  ignorance  of  the  kind 
of  food  necessary  for  little  tots.  There  they  lay,  help- 
less little  quivering  lumps  of  brown  flesh  on  little  white 
beds  in  rows.  Our  path  was  lined  with  the  sombre  eyes 
of  these  mites,  set  in  hollows  of  their  thin  faces,  almost 
like  fires  in  skulls.  For  me  they  assumed  an  ethnologi- 
cal interest,  for  the  variety  of  race  and  feature  there  was 
typical  of  the  fusion  of  races  that  is  going  on  all  over 
the  Pacific.  One  little  maiden,  sitting  bolt  upright,  re- 
garded us  with  contemplative  almond  eyes  like  a  small 
Kwannon.  Composure,  dignity,  and  a  kind  of  placid 
suffering  were  writ  on  the  countenance  of  this  upright 
lassie. 

"She  is  partly  Chinese,"  said  the  doctor. 

Next  to  her  a  little  dark  face  glowed  out  of  the  pillow 
with  a  kind  of  exotic  splendour.  It  was  a  Filipino  face, 
enriched,  enlivened,  pointed  up,  more  glowing,  more 
strange.  The  black  hair  curled  a  little  above  big  eyes 
that  had  a  curious  light  in  them,  vaguely  suggestive  to 
me  of  expressions  I  had  known  well. 

"She  is  partly  American  negro,"  said  the  doctor. 
"That  mixture  often  makes  children  of  great  personal 
beauty." 

On  the  opposite  side  lay  a  child  with  a  long  face  and 
a  certain  delicacy  of  hand  and  feature. 


226  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

"She  has  Spanish  blood,''  said  the  doctor  as  he  turned 
to  go. 

The  woman's  ward  Percy  was  not  allowed  to  visit. 
Whereupon  he  decided  that  I  was  not  interested  in  it, 
either,  and  bundled  me  into  the  car  again.  As  we  rode 
home,  the  heavens  and  all  the  horizons  round  about  were 
fired  with  a  great  and  awful  sunset.  For  here  in  the 
tropics  there  is  no  pensive  and  gradual  decay  of  light, 
no  twilight  amenities,  no  pearly  colourings,  as  in  our 
northern  lands.  There  is  only  a  swift  and  awful  con- 
flagration as  day  crashes  into  darkness  and  the  great 
clouds  roll  flaming  across  the  very  face  of  night. 

That  evening,  when  I  dined  with  Percy,  he  grew  com- 
municative and  told  me  the  story  of  his  wealth.  He 
was  the  second  son  of  a  modest  country  gentleman  who 
gave  him  an  excellent  education  but  left  his  property 
to  the  eldest  son.  It  was  expected  that  Percy  would 
either  go  into  the  church,  find  a  sinecure  position  in 
the  government,  or  set  up  some  colonial  enterprise  too 
remote  to  sully  the  genteel  escutcheon  of  his  house. 
These  alternatives  were  equally  distasteful  to  Percy. 
While  he  was  an  undergraduate,  he  made  a  speech  in 
a  little  debating  club  in  which  he  and  some  of  his  fel- 
lows used  to  gather  to  air  their  opinions — the  substance 
of  which  was  that  the  first  and  most  fundamental  of 
crimes  is  poverty.  The  willingness  of  the  average  man 
to  be  poor,  to  sell  his  life  into  daily  slavery  for  just 
enough  to  keep  him  going,  is  a  soil  in  which  all  the 
wrong  and  oppression  and  thievery  in  the  world  flour- 
ish. "The  thing  for  each  man  to  do,"  he  said,  "is  to  go 
after  money — not  a  little  money,  mind  you,  but  a  lot  of 
it.  The  world  could  yield  every  human  being  an  ade- 
quate fortune  if  we'd  only  treat  it  right.  As  for  me,  I 
am  going  to  get  money.  I'm  going  to  get  so  much  while 


PERCY,  THE  PLUTOCRAT  227 

I  am  young  that  I'll  never  have  to  think  of  it  again,  and 
can  live  out  my  life  in  peace.  If  you  don't  meet  and 
throttle  this  matter  of  finance  at  the  outset,  you  are  its 
slave  for  life." 

There  was  a  boyish  audacity  in  the  idea,  but  he  had 
realized  it  in  all  the  effort  of  his  manhood.  After  dis- 
gracing his  family  by  going  "into  trade"  as  a  menial 
in  a  Scottish  firm,  he  had  saved  and  worked  and  bought 
shares.  Now  he  owned  that  firm,  and  it  was  one  of  the 
largest  in  the  world.  At  thirty-nine  he  had  "succeeded." 

He  should  have  been  a  happy  man.  But  happiness  is 
a  blossom  as  capricious  as  love,  and  no  man  can  tell  in 
what  soil  it  will  take  root.  As  I  looked  at  his  tense  face, 
his  keen  but  miserable  eyes,  his  slightly  trembling  hand, 
I  thought  of  the  freshness,  the  pure  boyish  gaiety  of  one 
I  knew  whose  career  had  blossomed  along  the  highways 
of  poverty  and  adventure  that  paid  no  homage  to  prop- 
erty and  asked  no  alms  of  wealth.  He  looked  like  one 
who  had  put  his  very  soul  into  the  crucible  that  had 
drawn  his  gold  from  the  world. 

While  we  were  talking  thus  at  dinner,  I  realized  that 
I  was  becoming  an  object  of  notice  to  a  gorgeous  thing 
at  a  nearby  table,  a  gleaming,  silken  creature,  sleek  with 
the  hand  of  the  masseuse  and  all  alight  with  jewels. 
Finally  from  her  vanity  bag,  she  drew  out  a  little  gold 
and  gemmed  pencil,  and  scribbled  a  note  which  the 
waiter  brought  to  Percy.  With  an  apology  to  me,  he 
glanced  at  it,  and  tucked  it  away  in  his  pocket,  with  a 
constrained,  bitter  little  smile. 

Afterwards,  as  we  walked  in  the  garden,  he  inquired 
about  the  meaning  of  the  little  ring  on  my  finger,  and 
when  I  told  him,  briefly  and  frankly,  he  patted  me 
gravely  on  the  head,  and  said  I  was  a  good  girl  and  de- 
served to  be  happy.  Then  pacing  up  and  down  in  his 


228  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

restless  way,  while  I  sat  on  the  bench  beneath  a  palm- 
tree,  he  burst  out,  addressing  me  by  my  Christian  name : 
"Marjorie,  will  you  listen  to  me  if  I  tell  you  something- 
something  only  about  myself?  I  don't  know  why  I  have 
felt,  from  the  first  day,  that  you  were  somehow  appointed 
to  be  my  confessor ;  perhaps  it's  just  that  I  am  a  neurotic 
fool." 

He  paused,  and  I  reassured  him,  as  best  I  could, 
awaiting  his  confidence  with  curiosity  and  a  kind  of 
dread.  He  walked  up  and  down  in  silence  for  a  mo- 
ment, and  then  said,  "You  won't  think  me  a  cad  if  I 
show  you  her  note,  will  you?" 

He  drew  out  the  scrap  of  paper  on  which  the  gleam- 
ing lady  had  written :  "Don't  flirt  so  hard,  Percy.  Re- 
member India."  It  was  signed,  "Dinkey." 

Tearing  it  into  bits,  he  started  to  speak,  hesitated, 
paced  up  and  dowrn  in  silence,  and  then  finally  said: 
"I  can't  do  it,  Marjorie.  But  I'll  wrrite  you  a  long  letter, 
may  I?  I'll  wrrite  it  on  shipboard  and  mail  it  back  from 
Hongkong." 

I  felt  a  little  sceptical  about  this,  but  concurred,  both 
glad  and  sorry  to  be  released,  and  we  returned  in  silence 
to  the  door  of  the  hotel. 

Next  day,  at  noon,  the  ship  sailed,  and  with  it  Percy 
sailed  out  of  my  life,  still  begging  and  receiving  per- 
mission to  write  me  something  of  his  mysterious  story. 
I  never  received  the  letter.  It  may  be  that,  like  others, 
it  followed  me  from  port  to  port,  till  it  fell  to  pieces  un- 
read. It  may  be  that,  having  relieved  his  heart,  he  him- 
self tore  it  to  pieces.  But  no  doubt  the  whole  impulse 
to  confess  died  in  the  impersonal  and  widening  distance 
between  us.  He  was  a  man  to  touch  the  heart  and 
pique  the  interest  and  flatter  the  vanity  of  any  girl. 
Yet  I  was  almost  relieved  when  he  resigned  me  to  more 


PERCY,  THE  PLUTOCRAT  229 

peaceable  movements  in  humbler  paths.  lie  reminded 
me  of  the  Turk's  conception  of  British  progress  :  "Whir- 
whir — all  by  wheels.  Whiz-whiz — all  by  steam."  In  the 
puzzle  and  the  hopes  of  my  own  simple  life  at  that  time, 
there  seemed  small  room  for  a  force  so  powerful,  egoisti- 
cal, and  disturbing. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

THE  M.  D.  DIVISION  OF  THE  BUREAU  OF  LABOR 

PERCY  had  given  me  little  opportunity  to  run  down  all 
my  mail,  so  that  it  was  not  till  after  his  departure  that 
its  full  purport  burst  upon  me.  From  the  time  that  I 
first  discovered  how  uncertain  in  the  Orient  were  my 
postal  connections  with  home,  I  had  directed  that  all 
important  letters  be  sent  to  Manila  and  held  there  till 
a  certain  date,  when  I  would  either  come  for  them  or 
indicate  a  place  to  which  they  might  be  forwarded.  So 
there  was  a  pile  of  documents  awaiting  me,  and  mere 
paper  and  stamps  could  hardly  be  more  overwhelming. 
For,  from  first  to  last,  they  fulfilled  that  old  hope  of  mine 
of  India,  now  forgotten,  in  the  shape  of  tasks,  orders, 
funds,  and  passport.  Never  was  a  dream  more  inop- 
portunely consummated.  Why  should  this  new  prospect 
and  duty  be  interposed  in  a  situation  already  tangled? 
Yet  through  it  all  there  gleamed  a  little  hope.  Every- 
thing had  been  arranged  so  that  I  need  not  be  home  till 
January.  If  I  could  wait  till  January,  perhaps  Sydney 
could  come  home  with  me,  perhaps — but  why  detail  the 
possibilities?  In  those  days  we  hung  upon  the  word 
perhaps,  for  chance  then  ruled  even  the  destinies  of 
nations  and  turned  our  lives  from  day  to  day  into  most 
unexpected  courses. 

In  this  dilemma  I  fell  back  upon  a  method  which  is 
exasperating  to  many  people,  but  which  brings  to  those 
who  can  practise  it  both  diversion  and  peace  of  mind. 

230 


THE  M.  D.  DIVISION  231 

I  simply  put  the  matter  by,  and  waited.    There  was  still 
the  cable  from  home  to  come. 

In  the  interim,  I  turned  to  look  more  closely  into  my 
new  strange  neighbourhood,  this  last  frontier  of  the 
Americans — and  so  I  came  to  know  a  little  more  of 
Manila,  and  something  of  the  country  beyond  it,  even 
to  the  lairs  of  the  negritos  in  the  mountains.  Manila 
itself  was  a  leisurely  moss-grown  town,  shadowed  by 
trees,  which  bore  no  stamp  of  the  hustling  commercial 
race  that  has  assumed  the  guidance  of  its  destinies. 
There  are  few  fine  office  buildings  or  satisfactory  shops. 
Though  we  are  said  to  be  a  money-getting  people,  the 
Philippine  protectorate  is  the  only  government  by  white 
men  in  the  Orient  which  is  not  primarily  commercial  in 
origin  and  purpose.  In  Hongkong,  in  Shanghai,  in 
Singapore,  the  outstanding  buildings  are  those  devoted 
to  big  business  or  the  governmental  and  social  relations 
growing  out  of  it.  In  Manila  it  is  quite  otherwise.  The 
structures  built  under  American  supervision  are  mainly 
educational  or  philanthropic  in  character  and  suggest 
not  so  much  the  ambition  of  New  York  City  as  the  studi- 
ous repose  of  Cambridge  or  Princeton. 

Indeed,  it  is  the  work  of  the  educator  which  gives  the 
special  character  to  our  rule,  bringing  into  Philippine 
life,  at  its  beginning  and  very  heart,  a  new  quality  of 
mind  and  mannerism,  unmistakable  as  the  taste  of  an 
olive.  Sometimes,  as  I  passed  by  beneath  the  overhang- 
ing galleries  of  some  old  Spanish  house,  catching  a 
glimpse  behind  the  arched  doorway  of  a  courtyard  where 
palms  grew  among  remnants  of  broken  pottery,  and  the 
family  washing  hung  on  the  palms,  I  would  smile  to 
see  some  little  figure  in  hair-ribbons  and  middy  blouse 
emerging,  and  under  its  arms  an  arithmetic,  a  geography, 
and  a  Fourth  Reader  all  nicely  strapped  together.  A 


232  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

quaint  emanation  of  foreign  rule,  the  quainter  for  the 
imported  detail  of  dress  and  educational  paraphernalia ! 
At  noon  such  emanations  would  fill  the  streets,  boys  and 
girls  walking  together  in  co-educational  freedom,  sunny, 
talking  little  creatures  oddly  like  school-children  in 
America. 

Of  this  student  life  I  saw  more  when  I  moved  into 
one  of  the  girls'  dormitories  associated  with  the  Uni- 
versity of  the  Philippines.  These  dormitories  are  sup- 
ported by  various  philanthropic  and  religious  agencies, 
among  them  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.,  the  Methodists,  and  the 
Catholic  Church. 

The  hostel  in  which  I  was  lodged  was  much  like  any 
school  dormitory  at  home,  except  that  there  was  less 
"rough-housing"  and  "student  activities."  It  was  full 
of  soft  brown  kittenlike  maidens  who  never  seemed  to 
scamper  and  scream  along  the  corridors  after  the  fash- 
ion of  my  own  school-days,  but  who  created  an  atmos- 
phere of  soft  laughter  and  low,  purring  talk.  They 
were  not  above  little  pranks,  like  stealing  each  other's 
bananas  at  supper,  and  there  was  among  them  a  variety 
of  small  feuds.  But  the  external  peace  of  the  house  re- 
mained unbroken.  When  I  met  these  maidens  pattering 
along  the  corridors  in  their  kimonos  on  the  way  to  a 
bath,  or  spluttering  under  the  cold  water  in  the  big 
stone-floored  lavatory,  they  used  to  smile  shyly  upon  me, 
and  their  faces  were  like  placid  little  forest  pools  with 
the  glint  of  sunlight  upon  them. 

Some  of  the  girls  were  still  high-school  lassies  in  the 
middy  and  skirt  that  form  the  standard  uniform 
in  schools  under  American  tutelage.  Some  of  them  were 
demure  young  ladies  in  the  university  who  wore  the 
shoulder  draperies  and  long  trains  of  the  Filipino  cos- 
tume and  flirted  delicately  with  invisible  beings  over 


In  the  British  legation  in  Peking  the  scars  of  the  Boxer  up- 
rising are  now  healed  with  grass  and  flowers 


These   little  brown  women   had  the   grace   and   naturalness   of 
wild  animals 


Here  was  a  chance  to  penetrate  the  charming  mystery  behind 
the  vine-covered  veranda 


My  mind  reached  out  to  the  wilder  nooks  and  crannies  of  the 
island  of  Luzon 


THE  M.  D.  DIVISION  233 

the  telephone.  Usually  these  conversations  were  in  Eng- 
lish, and  I  would  smile  to  hear  the  quaint  phrases  rip- 
pling along  with  a  curious  lack  of  accent  which  made 
them  seem  not  our  own  emphatic  speech  at  all,  but  some 
more  melodious  tongue. 

For  a  day  or  two  after  I  arrived,  all  went  well.  Then 
one  morning  we  awoke  to  face  a  strike.  A  factory 
nearby  was  offering  higher  wages,  and  the  "boys"  who 
ran  the  household  machinery  had  all  departed.  Even 
my  "boy,"  who  used  to  polish  my  floors  by  skating  wildly 
around  the  room  on  two  cloths  attached  to  his  two  bare 
feet,  was  gone.  The  whole  domestic  staff,  it  seems,  had 
been  going  to  night-school,  which  had  caused  them  to 
develop  a  scorn  of  home  economics. 

Consternation  reigned.  The  cumbrous  mechanics  of 
Oriental  housekeeping  cannot  proceed  without  armies  of 
servants.  They  take  the  place  of  plumbing  and  gas  and 
most  other  household  appliances.  The  tale  of  our 
troubles  went  abroad  through  the  educational  world. 
Suddenly  a  deliverer  appeared.  A  smart  Filipino  youth 
with  an  American  smile  presented  himself  at  the  door 
with  a  note.  It  read :  "The  M.  D.  Division  of  the  Bu- 
reau of  Labour  offers  its  services." 

The  M.  D.  Division  of  the  Bureau  of  Labour  proved  to 
be  the  Methodist  Dormitory  for  young  men,  who  were 
students  in  the  university.  Here  was  a  chance  to  pene- 
trate the  charming  mystery  behind  the  vine-covered 
porch  and  the  shy  brown  faces  of  the  dormitory  for 
young  women.  All  day  the  M.  D.  Division  arrived — 
smiling,  debonair,  prodigiously  interested  in  household 
tasks,  announcing,  with  one  eye  on  the  matron  and  the 
other  upon  some  delicate  dark  head  peering  over  the 
banister,  that  their  "union  would  go  the  labour  unions 
one  better." 


234  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

When  news  of  these  domestic  volunteers  went  abroad 
through  all  the  recesses  of  the  house,  there  was  a  flutter 
and  prattle  among  the  inhabitants  of  the  dormitory. 
Then  one  by  one  each  maiden  discovered  that  she  also 
had  a  singular  aptitude  for  domestic  affairs.  So,  when 
a  row  of  young  men  filed  in  on  one  side,  a  row  of  ex- 
tremely helpful  young  women  filed  in  on  the  other.  The 
masculine  half  of  the  new  labour  union  glanced  gleefully 
around  the  room,  and  kept  up  a  continual  flow  of  smart 
talk.  But  the  feminine  half  adjusted  its  draperies, 
looked  at  its  slim  little  feet,  and  said  nothing.  Never- 
theless it  was  a  most  delectable  dinner-hour.  Every 
one  was  so  busy  waiting  on  tables  that  there  was  no  one 
left  to  be  waited  upon. 

This  heavenly  condition  of  affairs  lasted  for  two  days. 
Then  a  new  batch  of  "boys"  arrived,  and  the  temporary 
incumbents  reluctantly  resigned  from  their  jobs.  But 
in  all  the  restless  stirrings  of  the  proletariat  in  the 
Philippines,  as  elsewhere,  there  is  one  body  of  citizens 
for  whom  labour  troubles  in  their  near  vicinity  have  no 
terrors,  and  that  is  the  M.  D.  Division  of  the  Bureau  of 
Labour. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

BACK   TO  THE   PRIMITIVE 

THOUGH  I  found  student  life  of  the  Philippines  amus- 
ing and  delightful, — fresh,  humorous,  buoyant,  with  all 
sorts  of  Yankee  mannerisms  and  customs, — my  imagina- 
tion reached  out  to  wilder  nooks  and  crannies  of  this 
great  island  of  Luzon.  I  had  heard  of  the  Igorrotes, 
a  gifted  tribe  of  ex-head-hunters  who  were  now  yielding 
a  little  to  the  overtures  of  imported  Americanism,  and 
of  the  negritos,  a  tribe  of  pygmies  inhabiting  certain  re- 
mote corners  of  the  mountains.  They  were  thought  to 
be  remnants  of  an  aboriginal  folk  who  once  inhabited 
considerable  portions  of  the  world  and  are  probably 
more  nearly  representative  of  the  first  human  beings 
who  appeared  on  this  globe  than  any  other  living  tribes. 
They  survive  here  and  there  in  the  islands  of  the  Pacific 
and  in  Africa  in  certain  fastnesses  where  they  must  have 
taken  refuge  against  the  hordes  of  bigger  and  hardier 
men  out  of  which  the  savages  of  historic  times  were  bred. 
A  shy,  nomad  folk,  hard  to  find  and  come  among,  they 
had  learned  to  trust  certain  of  the  native  Protestants 
who  maintained  a  Filipino  as  missionary  in  their  midst. 
Through  the  medium  of  this  person  I  hoped  to  gain  ac- 
cess to  their  haunts. 

I  was  warned  not  to  undertake  such  a  journey.  I 
could  find  no  one  to  travel  with  me,  and  the  season  was 
bad.  For  these  were  the  months  of  rains.  The  island 
of  Luzon  resembled  a  sponge.  Squeeze  it  anywhere,  and 
it  exuded  water.  Half  of  it  was  now  a  mud-hole  and  half 

235 


236  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

of  it  a  luxuriant  tangle  of  vegetation,  now  grown  blowsy 
and  ungraceful  from  too  much  nourishment,  like  a  fat 
woman.  Everything  was  in  a  process  of  solution.  One 
almost  expected  the  whole  island  to  be  washed  away  into 
the  waves  of  the  warm  encroaching  ocean.  I  was 
warned  that  the  roads  would  be  torrents,  and  the  rail- 
roads would  be  washed  out,  and  that  I  should  probably 
be  stuck  somewhere,  like  Noah  on  Mount  Ararat,  to 
await  the  subsidence  of  water. 

Nevertheless  I  started,  with  only  a  schedule  of  places 
and  routes  and  a  limited  portion  of  cash  as  security.  I 
soon  found  that,  despite  the  blessed  frequency  of  tele- 
phones, bathrooms,  and  school-teachers,  which  are  the 
American  legacy  to  the  Philippines,  there  has  never  been 
a  corresponding  development  in  the  comfort  of  travel. 
The  institutions  and  amenities  which  pave  the  way  for 
the  wayfarer  in  English  territory  are  here  almost  wholly 
lacking.  There  are  neither  hotels,  accommodation 
houses,  nor  dak-bungalows — neither  tea  nor  shilling 
novels.  The  American  who  ventures  out  of  Manila  must 
throw  himself  on  the  mercy  of  school-teachers,  mission- 
aries, and  army  folk,  wherever  he  happens  to  find  their 
encampments.  The  trains  are  planned  with  no  regard 
to  Occidental  prejudices.  There  is  not  even  a  fre- 
quency of  white  faces  at  anything  that  may  be  deemed 
official  centres.  Only  neat  little  bungalows  of  concrete 
here  and  there  flourish  a  starry  flag  and  perhaps  a  sun- 
burned Yankee  face  in  token  of  imported  learning  and 
unlimited  self-sacrifice  in  its  distribution. 

As  I  went  on,  a  curious  loneliness  overtook  me — so 
shabby  and  sombre  was  the  rain-soaked  earth,  so  little 
and  forlorn  the  railroads  and  the  railroad  stations. 
When  some  one  suggested  that  I  might  find  an  automo- 
bile going  to  Baguio,  I  proceeded  in  search  of  it  gladly. 


237 

I  found  it  in  the  sole  possession  of  a  freckled,  florid, 
dowdy  American,  with  a  red  moustache,  who  announced 
that  he  practised  law.  As  we  set  forth,  he  grew  expansive 
on  the  subject.  Yes,  law  was  very  interesting  in  the 
Philippines.  Take  these  Igorrotes,  now.  They  were  al- 
ways squatting  on  each  other's  territory,  with  conse- 
quent crude  litigation,  intended  to  settle  the  precise  loca- 
tion and  value  of  a  stone  placed  between  two  strips  of 
mountain  earth  by  an  ancestor,  who  was  most  probably  a 
head-hunter,  and  possibly  a  cannibal — and  most  cer- 
tainly an  old  rascal  wrho  never  heard  of  the  Ten  Com- 
mandments. Queer  that  a  civilized  man  and  a  Christian 
should  waste  his  good  learning  supporting  the  decision 
of  an  old  duffer  of  a  heathen  now  luckily  deceased! 

Then  take  the  Americans  in  the  Philippines.  He 
couldn't  hand  them  much  when  it  came  to  the  troubles 
they  made  for  the  legal  fraternity.  He  had  a  case  now, 
a  nice  chap,  graduate  of  Princeton,  in  fact,  and  brought 
up  in  a  Presbyterian  Sunday  School,  engaged  to  a  per- 
fectly nice  girl  at  home  and  dead  in  love  with  her,  too. 
Yet  the  young  fool  had  let  one  of  these  Filipino  girls 
believe  herself  married  to  him,  and  now  he  was  having 
the  dickens  of  a  time  meeting  his  duplex  engagements 
in  matrimony.  It  would  take  some  money  and  much 
law  to  extricate  him.  If  it  weren't  for  that  darn  pretty 
girl  back  home,  he'd  tell  the  young  idiot  to  go  whistle 
for  it. 

So  he  grumbled,  as  we  rode  through  the  steaming 
landscape.  Remnants  of  Spain  had  now  disappeared. 
We  were  out  in  a  low,  sun-bright  land,  dank  and  over- 
grown and  full  of  muddy  pools  where  the  water  buffalo 
stood  at  ease.  Now  and  then  a  little  naked  brown  boy 
emerged  from  the  jungle  and  called  "Hello!"  One  of 
the  minor  results  of  the  American  occupation  of  the 


238  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Philippines  is  that  every  jungle  baby  seems  to  learn  this 
word.  Often  we  sped  down  long  avenues  of  palms, 
among  which  stood  the  native  houses.  They  were  wholly 
fashioned  of  woven  woods,  these  houses,  like  great 
baskets,  and  thatched  with  palm  leaves.  Set  high  above 
the  ground  on  poles,  they  carried  all  domestic  life  into 
the  realms  of  birds  and  tree  animals,  and  made  their  in- 
habitants seem  aboreal  citizens  who  descended  only  by 
accident  to  earth.  Afterwards  I  tasted  the  hospitality 
of  these  strange  dwellings  and  found  it  good. 

So  thick  and  luxuriant  were  the  trees  that  stood  all 
about  our  course,  that  only  a  few  of  the  houses  were 
clearly  visible.  But  it  was  plain  by  many  signs  that 
these  cocoanut  groves  were  populous.  In  one  place  an 
American  flag  on  a  palm  tree  and  a  hum  of  voices  pro- 
claimed a  primary  school.  Further  on,  a  bamboo  held 
the  name-plate  of  "L.  Moreno,  Evangelist."  There  was 
no  sign  of  L.  Moreno's  person,  much  less  of  his  church, 
but  this  was  evidently  a  finger-post  to  salvation  that 
lurked  among  the  cocoanuts. 

The  floods  whereof  we  had  warning  were  obvious 
enough.  Through  river  after  river  we  plunged  as 
blithely  as  if  our  good  vehicle  carried  keel  and  sail,  till 
at  last  we  began  to  climb  among  the  mountains  in  in- 
stant terror  of  washouts,  and  the  heat  fell  from  us  like 
a  woolen  blanket.  Palms  gave  place  to  delicate  and 
fragile  pines,  and  the  mists  rolled  down  to  meet  us.  It 
seemed  almost  as  if  we  might  find  sunshine  above  the 
lower  sky.  Then  we  came  into  the  environment  of 
Baguio,  and  pleasantly  skimmed  over  macadam  roads, 
past  lawns  and  bungalows.  This  is  the  summer  capital 
of  the  Philippines,  and  here  the  rude  land  was  shaved 
and  massaged  and  made  fit  for  the  presence  of  gentle- 
men. At  that  time  it  was  all  deserted,  but  beautiful 


BACK  TO  THE  PRIMITIVE  239 

in  its  loneliness.  Meanwhile  the  slim,  flat-faced  people 
of  the  lowlands  gave  place  to  a  stockier  folk  of  a  kind 
of  sooty  black — a  muscular,  sullen-eyed,  heavy-browed 
lot,  arrayed  in  remnants  of  coats  and  hats,  but  boasting 
not  one  pair  of  breeches  among  them.  These  were  the 
Igorrotes,  an  able  people,  in  their  way,  with  a  dis- 
tinguished history  as  head-hunters. 

Just  as  we  reached  an  inn  where  we  might  dry  our 
clothes  before  a  fireplace  of  mountain  stone,  the  heavens 
opened  and  the  waters  descended.  Thereafter,  for  days 
on  end,  the  rain  flogged  the  raw  and  tortured  earth, 
and  cut  the  channels  of  a  thousand  rivers,  and  all  my 
investigations  were  made  in  those  softer  interludes  when 
torrents  gave  place  to  showers.  Yet,  here  where  I  seemed 
farthest  from  home  and  the  dear  faces  of  my  own  kind, 
I  was  blessed  with  the  one  direct  contact  with  my  own 
land  and  household  that  came  to  me  in  all  my  journey- 
ing, and  here  I  came  to  a  decision  that  put  half  the 
world  between  me  and  my  hopes. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

EX-HEAD-HUNTERS 

WHILE  indecision  still  hung  over  my  mind,  my  expected 
cable  came  through  and  found  me  even  in  the  moun- 
tains, being  telegraphed  to  Baguio,  and  travelling  thence 
to  me  by  the  feet  of  a  dripping  Igorrote.  It  was  signed 
by  my  family  and  read :  "We  approve  India  and  Sydney.'' 
So  instant  and  so  mysterious  was  this  airy  message, 
seeking  me  out  even  among  the  savage  heights  of  the 
rain-locked  mountains,  that  it  filled  me  for  days  not 
only  with  gladness  but  with  a  kind  of  awe,  as  if  it  had 
come  through  to  me  on  the  wings  of  spirits,  and  had 
found  me  out  by  the  kindliness  of  a  god.  Its  purport  I 
could  not  misunderstand.  Written  out  of  a  better 
knowledge  of  the  complex  and  changing  circumstances 
that  ruled  my  destinies  than  I  myself  had  at  so  great 
a  distance,  it  settled  my  mind  like  the  casting  of  a  lot. 
Henceforth  my  face  was  set  toward  India.  From  those 
lonely  hills  I  sent  forth  messages  as  airily  as  this  had 
come.  To  Sydney  I  cabled  my  decision  to  go  on  to  India 
and  return  to  Japan  to  marry  him  in  January.  It  was 
the  first  time  I  promised  more  than  general  fealty,  and 
I  looked  to  the  absoluteness  of  the  pledge  to  atone  for 
my  failure  to  return  to  Japan  immediately. 

Apart  from  the  lovely  and  spiritual  contact  with 
home,  my  chief  excitement  in  Baguio  were  the  Igorrotes. 
In  some  respects  they  were  a  marvellous  set  of  savages. 
They  had  an  integrity  and  skill  of  hand  that  civiliza- 
tion itself  might  well  envy.  Their  hills  terraced  and 

240 


EX-HEAD-HUNTERS  241 

fortified  against  floods  with  masonry,  their  houses 
stoutly  built  and  neatly,  though  crudely,  carpentered, 
and  their  beautiful  cloths  woven  of  cotton  to  last  a  life- 
time, and  dyed  in  clear,  lustrous  greens  and  yellows  and 
blues  and  scarlets  that  knew  no  fear  of  rain  or  sun- 
shine— all  attested  to  the  wholesomeness  and  finish  of 
their  simple,  material  culture.  But  they  also  had  cus- 
toms which  were,  to  my  mind,  unseemly.  For  instance, 
they  dined  on  dogs.  At  first  this  information  did  not 
disturb  me,  for  I  imagined  this  canine  food  of  theirs  to 
be  the  flesh  of  some  wolfish  creature,  as  different  from 
our  Gyps  and  Fidos  at  home  as  a  tiger  is  different  from 
a  domestic  pussy.  With  the  first  visit  to  the  dog  mar- 
ket, this  comfortable  assurance  vanished.  The  creatures 
there  offered  for  sale  and  cooking  were  mongrel  in  breed, 
but  such  as  might  have  played  about  some  village  street 
at  home.  In  their  pensive  brown  eyes  there  seemed  ca- 
pacities for  play  and  simple  frolic  that  could  add  much 
to  the  joy  of  children  and  the  comfort  of  a  lonely  house, 
but  very  little  flavour  to  the  dinner.  One  would  as  soon 
think  of  eating  one's  own  brother. 

The  Igorrotes  have  been  taught  to  be  rather  proud  of 
their  savagery.  They  used  to  come  around  to  sell  me 
the  baskets  in  which  it  had  been  the  custom  of  their 
people  to  carry  home  the  heads  of  enemies.  And  they 
expected  me  to  delight  in  certain  carvings  of  intertwined 
male  and  female  figures  executed  in  hard  wood  with 
some  skill  of  hand  and  considerable  tainted  enjoyment. 
Many  Americans  enjoy  collecting  these  barbarous  things, 
but  I  thought  I  should  as  soon  live  with  their  makers. 
Once,  after  looking  at  some  of  these  little  figures,  I  came 
upon  the  old  wooden  door  of  a  Spanish  monastery,  carved 
by  the  hand  of  piety  and  covered  with  fresh  green  paint. 
The  technique  was  feeble  and  sentimental.  It  showed 


242  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

no  vigour  of  touch  nor  acuteness  of  anatomical  observa- 
tion. But  the  carving  represented  a  monk  with  a  laugh- 
ing babe  in  his  arms.  The  child  held  out  his  little  hands 
as  if  to  romp  and  crow,  but  the  head  of  the  monk  was 
downcast  and  melancholy,  and  his  cheek  pressed  ten- 
derly against  the  body  of  the  little  one  in  wistfulness 
and  renunciation.  Though  the  lives  of  these  old  fratres 
in  the  Philippines  had  been  far  from  edifying,  I  could 
not  but  think,  as  I  compared  the  Igorrote  and  the  Span- 
ish carving,  how  far  the  thoughts  of  men  climb  in  their 
progress  out  of  savagery  to  civilization. 

Among  the  Igorrotes,  the  Americans  have  succeeded 
in  establishing  some  schools,  mostly  agricultural  and 
trade  schools,  where  the  pupils  may  practise  their  minds 
in  the  morning  and  their  hands  in  the  afternoon.  The 
nice  young  man  in  charge  of  one  of  these  institutions 
spoke  with  a  beaming,  Y.  M.  C.  A.  sort  of  enthusiasm  of 
the  progress  of  his  pupils.  Some  pupils  apparently  did 
not  return  these  Christian  compliments  in  kind;  for 
when  he  ushered  me  into  an  empty  shack  where  the 
youngsters  learned  English,  there  on  the  board  was 
scrawled  some  boy's  first  spontaneous  use  of  the  new 
language.  "This  school  good  is  not.  Nothing  doing." 

With  such  brave  excursions  into  the  torrents  as 
my  wardrobe  would  stand,  I  stayed  in  these  mountains 
some  days.  I  used  to  call  each  day's  excursion  quits, 
when  I  had  used  up  the  last  available  scrap  of  dry  cloth- 
ing, and  had  to  sit  before  the  fire  and  wait  for  the 
processes  of  evaporation  to  take  their  course.  Yet  the 
rain  was  not  wholly  an  evil.  It  gave  to  these  hills  a 
romantic  wildness  and  loneliness,  a  remoteness  from  all 
the  world.  Forgotten  of  the  sunshine,  cut  off  from  the 
kindly  traffic  of  men,  they  seemed  a  place  where  all  the 
spirits  of  nature  might  meet  and  sport. 


EX-HEAD-HUNTERS  243 

One  evening  at  sunset  the  rain  abated  a  little  and  I 
walked  out  among  the  mists  that  swept  down  from  the 
heights.  I  was  alone  and  without  a  guide,  for  I  thought 
that  the  twinkle  of  light  from  my  lodging  would  point 
the  way  back.  As  I  walked  on,  I  felt  almost  as  if  I  had 
left  my  body  and  all  the  world  behind,  and  had  come 
into  some  dim  and  ghostly  region  beyond  the  bourne  of 
earthly  life.  Suddenly  a  great  white  figure  of  a  Ma- 
donna, with  a  child  in  her  arms,  emerged  like  some  liv- 
ing thing  from  the  mists,  tall  and  starry  white,  and  most 
graciously  beautiful.  Awe  and  terror  shook  my  mind. 
Was  I  a  nun  or  a  saint  that  I  should  see  visions  and 
dream  dreams  and  meet  Our  Lady  walking  visibly  upon 
the  heights?  Then  I  understood.  It  was  the  figure  of 
the  Virgin  Mary  which  certain  Belgian  fathers  had  set 
among  the  rocks  to  sweeten  and  disinfect,  as  it  were,  the 
memories  of  old  savagery.  The  twilight  and  the  mists 
and  the  ghostly  company  of  the  rain-soaked  hills  seemed 
to  startle  her  image  into  life  and  inform  it  with  ghostly 
being. 


CHAPTER  XXXI 

THE  PYGMIES 

"No,  no,  senorita.     It  is  impossible." 

"But  I  must  see  the  negritos." 

"No,  senorita,  there  are  floods  all  the  way.  You  can- 
not go  up  the  mountain." 

"But  didn't  you  come  down  the  mountain?" 

"Si,  senorita;  but  I  came  barefoot." 

"If  you  could  come  down  the  mountain  barefoot,  I 
can  go  up  it  on  the  same  kind  of  shoe-leather." 

Before  me  stood  a  little  man  from  the  mountains, 
dripping  and  splashed  with  mud,  and  beside  him  Ro- 
saria,  a  Filipino  deaconess,  beneath  whose  gauzy  winged 
sleeves  and  long  muslin  train,  I  knew,  beat  the  heart  of 
a  child  of  the  jungle — fearless  of  heat  and  intimate  with 
rain.  Rosaria  had  said  that  she  would  chaperon  me  on 
my  trip  into  the  mountains  to  see  the  negritos.  And 
taking  her  at  her  word,  I  had  landed  in  this  palmy  little 
Filipino  village,  without  escort  or  interpreter  or  any 
American  assistance.  I  had  been  greeted  with  informa- 
tion that  my  proposed  ascent  of  the  mountains  was  im- 
possible. Every  trail  was  flooded.  To  corroborate  her 
statement  she  sent  for  this  little  man  from  the  moun- 
tains who  came  swimming  down  to  warn  me.  But  I  per- 
sisted. What  they  could  do  I  could  do,  and  did  they  not 
live  and  move  in  this  yearly  deluge  of  water?  And, 
when  with  the  small  English  we  held  between  us,  I  made 
my  intention  plain,  Rosaria  offered  no  further  objec- 
tions. It  was  settled.  I  was  to  ascend  the  mountains 
barefoot. 

244 


THE  PYGMIES  24r> 

While  she  tucked  up  her  muslin  train,  I  removed  my 
shoes  and  girdefl  up  the  soft,  dark  silk  dress  I  wore  in 
travelling.  For  the  next  few  hours  I  knew  the  world 
only  in  terms  of  my  feet.  A  whole  new  realm  of  sen- 
sation was  opened  to  me.  First  there  was  the  long 
walk  on  a  squashy,  muddy  trail  through  rice-fields  where 
my  feet  pressed  deep  into  ooze  that  was  as  hot  as  if  it 
were  cooking  over  subterranean  fires.  Then  we  began 
to  climb  upon  a  trail  through  the  long  grass.  Ten  feet 
high  and  more,  this  grass  overtopped  me  like  a  forest  of 
trees,  and  created  around  me  a  strange  green  world. 
And  as  I  climbed,  across  my  toes  trickled  little  streams 
cool  from  the  mountain,  and  the  grass  cast  down  on  me 
its  treasured  raindrops  in  showers.  Sometimes  there 
were  pleasant  moments  when  one  might  go  softly  upon  a 
bit  of  turf  or  moss,  or  awkward  ones  when  the  stones  cut 
and  the  brambles  pricked,  and  ever  and  anon  we  stepped 
waist-high  into  mountain  torrents  that  swept  away  a 
weight  of  gathered  mud  from  our  feet  and  with  it  some 
feverishness  and  protesting  pain.  As  we  climbed,  the 
world  grew  cooler,  and  the  thatched  houses  of  the  low- 
lands vanished.  Here  the  world  was  silent  and  very 
lonely,  for  the  tropical  woods  seem  always  to  lack  that 
multitudinous  stir  and  buzz  and  singing  of  life  that  we 
know  among  our  northern  forests,  and  all  its  wild  in- 
habitants apparently  are  dumb.  Since  I  walked  faster 
than  my  companions,  and  my  feet,  over-delicate  with  the 
long  protection  of  civilization,  more  insistently  craved 
rest,  I  sprinted  ahead  of  the  guide  up  the  mountain, 
thinking  by  my  speed  to  gain  an  interval  of  repose.  In 
a  few  minutes  the  trees  had  hidden  them  from  me,  and 
I  was  quite  alone. 

Suddenly  there  was  a  rustle  among  the  bushes.  Be- 
fore me  on  the  trail  stood  the  tiniest  man  I  had  ever  seen. 


246  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

He  looked  like  an  elf,  or  a  brownie  at  least.  He  was 
quite  naked,  delicately  muscular  and  upright  in  his  bear- 
ing. In  his  hand  he  held  a  long  bow.  He  paused,  as 
startled  as  I,  then  smiled  hospitably  from  beneath  his 
shock  of  curling  black  hair,  and  vanished  with  a  kind 
of  war-whoop  up  the  trail.  I  had  seen  the  first  of  the 
negritos.  Being  a  bit  bashful  about  intruding  on  these 
strange  little  folk  without  introduction,  I  stopped  and 
waited  for  the  guide  and  Rosaria. 

When  they  came  up,  we  three  emerged  in  a  slightly 
cleared  space,  where  there  was  a  kind  of  lean-to  against 
a  tree.  Out  of  it  swarmed  the  little  people.  They  were 
only  about  four  feet  high,  tiny  as  children,  yet  with  the 
carriage  of  men,  though  in  some  cases  a  little  dwarfed 
and  out  of  proportion.  There  were  little  old  grand- 
sires  with  shocks  of  grey  hair  and  wee  wrinkled  faces, 
and  miniature  grandmothers,  and  the  tiniest  babes  I 
ever  saw.  They  were  clad  in  the  skirt  and  loin-cloths 
that  are  the  well-nigh  universal  costume  of  Malay  lands, 
and  both  their  garb  and  the  materials  of  which  it  was 
fashioned  indicated  some  dealings  with  the  lowlands. 
The  naked  little  man  who  had  greeted  me  on  the  trail 
now  appeared  in  the  remnant  of  a  frock-coat,  whose 
skirt  trailed  behind  him  on  the  ground  like  a  train. 

Conversation  with  them  was  about  as  instructive  as 
a  dialogue  with  squirrels,  since  Eosaria  and  I  under- 
stood not  a  syllable  of  their  lingo,  and  the  guide  made 
shift  with  about  five  phrases.  But  we  gathered  that  they 
lived  on  herbs  and  a  little  hill  rice  which  they  spasmodi- 
cally cultivated,  flavoured  with  the  meat  of  such  animals 
as  they  could  kill.  When  they  had  exhausted  the  food- 
supply  in  one  place,  they  moved  on  to  another.  They 
were  in  a  hurry  to  move  now,  because  one  of  their  num- 
ber had  died,  which  plainly  signified  that  an  evil  spirit 
had  taken  up  his  abode  in  this  place,  and  the  better  part 


A  naked  little  jungle  boy  emerged  and  said  "Hello" 


The  Igorrotes  are  an   able  tribe  with   a  distinguished   history 
as  head-hunters 


The  Igorrotes  have  an  unseemly  habit  of  dining  on  dogs 


She  was  enjoying  her  first  lesson  in  co-education 


THE  PYGMIES  247 

of  medicine  was  flight.  None  of  them  showed  any  inter- 
est in  me,  except  the  little  man  who  had  put  on  some 
manners  with  his  frock-coat.  They  watched  me  dully,  as 
if  smiles  and  gestures  were  a  language  they  did  not  know. 
But  they  passively  stood  aside  while  I  examined  their 
community  building,  a  rudely  thatched  roof,  with  a  kind 
of  shelf  running  under  about  half  of  it,  on  which  they 
might  climb  out  of  the  way  of  floods.  It  interested  me, 
because  like  the  dwellings  of  so  many  of  the  Pacific 
tribes,  it  seemed  a  primitive  sketch  of  the  idea  which 
has  been  developed  in  the  beautiful  and  highly  finished 
houses  of  Japan. 

Naturally,  conversation  with  these  little  beings  did 
not  proceed  apace,  and  the  external  details  of  their 
?:ves  offered  little  food  for  curiosity.  Bowing  them  a 
farewell  to  which  they  replied  with  blank  looks,  we 
started  downward  on  the  trail,  and  the  trees  closed  in 
behind  us.  Suddenly  on  the  path  there  popped  up  a 
brownie  of  a  wholly  different  species.  A  khaki  army 
hat  sat  upon  his  little  nose,  and  a  flannel  army  shirt 
draped  him  like  a  woman's  frock.  "Hello,"  he  said  af- 
fpbly,  giving  us  a  first-class  imitation  of  a  military  sa- 
lute. With  an  air  of  vast  importance  he  began  to  un- 
wrap some  great  package  in  his  hands.  This  he  pre- 
sented to  us  as  if  it  were  his  card.  It  was  a  kind  of 
"Keep  Off  the  Grass"  sign  bearing  the  name  of  the  near- 
est Filipino  constabulary.  Hearing  of  us,  he  had  ap- 
parently absconded  with  it  by  way  of  a  diploma  in 
American  civilization.  He  was  no  doubt  a  servant  or 
perhaps  a  mascot  at  the  camp.  The  manners  of  the 
little  man  were  a  perfect  imitation  of  the  brisk  strut 
of  an  American  officer.  When  we  offered  him  a  silver 
coin,  he  waved  it  aside  magnificently,  and  saluting 
again,  and  saying  "Hello"  by  way  of  a  farewell,  he  van- 
ished with  the  "Keep  Off  the  Grass"  sign  into  the  forest. 


248  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

I  slept  that  night  in  a  native  house.  The  dwelling- 
place  of  a  prosperous  Chinese  who  had  long  since 
altered  his  manners  and  habitation  to  the  customs  of 
his  adopted  isle,  it  was  nevertheless  more  spacious  and 
more  finished  than  those  of  most  of  his  neighbours.  Set 
high  among  the  trees,  and  large  as  a  comfortable  city 
apartment,  it  was  wholly  woven,  like  a  basket,  of  twigs 
and  supple  woods,  and  floored  with  split  bamboo  that 
yielded  like  elastic  to  the  tread.  Yet  it  was  furnished 
with  a  photograph  album  and  a  phonograph,  both  of 
which  were  put  through  their  paces  for  the  guest.  These 
amenities  over,  I  was  led  to  a  room  that  was  like  the 
inside  of  a  large  basket,  and  given  the  freedom  of  a 
large  Spanish  bed.  The  bed  boasted  of  neither  sheets 
nor  mattress — only  a  straw  mat  that  might  serve  as 
one  or  the  other  according  to  my  pleasure. 

Through  half  the  night  I  turned  and  tossed  in  exclu- 
sive concentration  of  my  mind  upon  the  remains  of  my 
feet.  Utterly  outwearied,  I  fell  asleep  toward  dawn. 
I  was  awakened  by  a  hot  splash  of  sunshine  across  my 
face  and  the  song  of  an  ecstatic  bird.  The  room  was 
alive  with  sunshine  that  sifted  in  flakes  and  twinkles 
through  the  interstices  of  the  woven  walls ;  and  luxuriat- 
ing for  a  moment  in  that  sunny  waking,  breathing  the 
grassy  fragrance  that  seemed  still  to  linger  in  the  mate- 
rials of  the  house,  and  looking  out  over  the  tops  of  low 
bushes,  upon  the  dewy  and  gleaming  jungle,  I  thought 
that  no  luxury  of  a  civilized  morning  had  ever  matched 
the  pure,  primeval  gladness  of  that  emergence  from 
dreams. 

This  was  my  last  adventure  in  the  Philippines.  Foot- 
sore, sunburned,  and  starving  for  real  food,  I  found  my 
way  back  to  Manila,  and  was  taken  again  into  the  arms 
of  the  great  sea  which  had  already  borne  me  so  far. 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

AT  THE  THRESHOLD  OF  INDIA 

FOUR  weeks  after  I  had  entered  Manila,  I  sailed  out  of 
it,  with  my  face  to  the  South  and  the  East.  Beyond 
lay  India,  and  the  ancient  magic  of  the  word  was  al- 
ready beginning  to  bind  my  reluctant  thoughts  to  itself. 
That  I  should  enter  India  easily  I  had  no  doubt.  Had 
I  not  engaged  passage  long  since  in  Shanghai  for  this 
very  month?  Was  I  not  provided  with  a  passport  of 
the  nation,  at  that  moment  the  mightiest  in  the  world? 

But  at  Hongkong  these  pleasant  little  dreams  were 
dissipated.  I  was  too  late  for  my  sailing.  The  passage 
which  was  the  original  cause  of  my  excursion  had  just 
been  pre-empted  by  some  one  else,  in  my  default,  and 
the  last  ship  which  promised  conveyance  to  India  for 
a  six-month  had  left  Hongkong.  Moreover,  it  seemed 
that  the  British  government  had  something  to  say  about 
my  entering  India.  Why  did  I  want  to  go?  Was  I  a 
pacifist,  a  socialist,  a  democrat,  or  a  spy?  Here  my  sex 
came  to  my  rescue.  No,  I  said,  I  was  merely  a  nice 
girl — I  had  friends  in  India  (remembering  at  that  mo- 
ment some  friends  of  Sydney's  who  might  substantiate 
this  claim).  I  wrote  a  little,  I  added,  "quite  harmless 
stuff." 

"Love  stories?"  asked  the  nice  young  emissary  of  the 
British  government  who  was  examining  my  orthodoxy, 
with  a  smile, — and  I  let  the  matter  pass  with  that, 
though  the  love  story  was  the  one  form  of  literature  I 
had  never  attempted.  The  British  government,  in  the 

249 


250  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

form  in  which  it  had  presented  itself,  was  touched  with 
my  plea,  though  I  must  confess  it  sounded  suspicious 
to  my  own  ears,  and  finally  added  all  the  insignia  of 
Hongkong  to  my  passport  with  the  air  of  presenting  me 
with  a  box  of  chocolates. 

Somewhat  fortified  with  the  imperial  decorations  on 
my  pass,  I  returned  to  Cook's  office.  Was  there  no  way 
of  getting  to  India?  None,  said  the  agent,  with  decision, 
adding  that,  if  I  wanted  to  take  a  little  jaunt  to  Singa- 
pore and  discover  how  hopeless  it  was,  there  was  a 
wretched  little  bark  proceeding  in  that  general  direc- 
tion with  people  bound  for  Borneo.  On  this  passage  I 
promptly  seized,  and  next  day  I  found  myself  at  sea  in 
a  little  boat,  scarcely  larger  than  a  river  tug,  committed 
to  an  indefinite  course  southward  along  the  coasts  of 
Asia.  Of  this  voyage  there  is  little  to  tell.  We  stopped 
at  a  Chinese  port  or  two,  ran  up  two  or  three  rivers, 
and  then  slipped  into  quiet,  tropical  seas,  and  saw  no 
land  for  nine  days.  My  cabin-mate  was  a  Mrs.  Robins, 
a  British  woman  scarce  out  of  girlhood,  the  daughter 
of  a  British  Admiral.  For  three  years  she  had 
lived  under  the  hourly  terror  of  the  air  raids,  and 
most  of  the  men  of  her  family  were  dead  or  vilely  in- 
jured. She  often  talked  of  the  war  but  always  with  a 
curious,  hard,  impersonal  gaiety,  and  spent  her  time 
flirting  restlessly  with  the  two  or  three  Englishmen 
on  board  and  putting  on  and  off  the  lacy,  extrava- 
gant wardrobe  which  she  had  purchased  by  way  of 
celebrating  her  escape  from  England.  -She  was  going 
to  join  the  remnants  of  her  family  in  Borneo,  but 
was  fundamentally  indifferent  to  them  as  to  every- 
thing else.  Yet,  for  all  her  apparent  lack  of  heart 
and  conscience,  she  remained  a  nice  woman  and  a  lady 


AT  THE  THRESHOLD  OF  INDIA          251 

from  sheer  force  of  habit,  nor  could  any  present  per- 
formance wholly  conceal  something  nobler  in  her  past. 

In  almost  intolerable  ennui  the  days  dragged  on.  The 
men  played  cards  from  dawn  to  sunset,  and  talked,  when 
they  talked  at  all,  about  the  war.  On  this  point  two 
weeks  without  news  ( for  we  had  had  none  since  we  left 
Hongkong)  raised  every  one's  anxiety  to  the  fever  pitch. 
When  we  had  sailed  from  Hongkong  there  had  been 
faint  stirrings  of  hope.  The  German  offensive  was 
broken;  the  Americans  were  in  with  both  feet.  What 
next? 

One  morning  I  was  awakened  from  a  suffocation  of 
damp  heat,  by  a  kind  of  parody  of  an  old  familiar  sound : 
"Extra!  Extra!"  I  sat  up  and  listened.  The  voice 
went  on,  "Surrender  of  Turkey,"  and  there  were  wild 
whoops  and  a  mighty  scramble  of  feet.  I  looked  out. 
The  ship  had  come  to  rest  in  a  harbour.  Beyond,  the 
low,  white,  many-arched  buildings  of  Singapore  were 
shining  out  of  the  blue  mist  and  opaque  sunlight  of 
the  equatorial  morning.  I  whistled  a  query  about  the 
celebration  above  out  of  my  porthole,  to  a  strange 
dark  being  with  a  beard  and  scarlet  petticoat  who 
was  bobbing  around  in  a  boat  just  beneath  me. 
This  hermaphrodite,  it  seemed,  was  a  money-changer 
who  had  come  out  to  greet  the  ship.  The  most  en- 
terprising of  the  Englishmen  had  met  him,  and  had 
told  him  he  would  have  to  prove  that  his  filthy  dollars 
were  good  money  by  going  back  to  land  and  buying  a 
newspaper  with  them — and  now  this  same  Englishman 
was  parading  his  prize  around  the  decks  above. 

I  digested  my  thoughts  on  the  news  in  silence.  On 
these  surrenders  hung  all  my  plans,  and,  perhaps  for 
that  reason,  I  stifled  hope.  Yet  hope  is  the  most  stub- 


252  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

born  of  the  emotions  of  the  heart,  and  the  high  spirits 
which  the  news  induced  in  the  British  passengers  added 
something  to  the  natural  gladness  of  landing. 

I  had  come  to  Singapore  in  a  tub,  and  it  was  plain 
that  if  I  was  to  get  away  in  any  direction,  even  by  the 
path  I  had  come  on,  it  would  have  to  be  in  a  cocoanut 
shell.  Ships  on  the  Eastern  seas  were  growing  scarcer 
and  scarcer,  and  there  was  not  a  steamship  company 
that  would  promise  me  passage  of  any  sort  to  any  point 
except  Java.  Yet  every  day  I  called  on  the  offices  of 
ocean-going  barks,  patient  and  persistent. 

Meanwhile,  there  was  the  pageantry  of  the  streets  of 
Singapore  which  not  even  one  so  pre-occupied  as  I 
could  see  without  daily  pleasure.  Already  I  was  be- 
ginning to  breathe  the  air  of  India;  for  Singapore  has 
the  atmosphere,  the  perfume,  of  India,  something  unmis- 
takable as  the  breath  of  sandal  wood.  Singapore  is  in- 
deed a  little  epitome  of  the  Orient.  It  is  the  meeting- 
point  for  the  three  great  types  of  Oriental  peoples— 
the  yellow  people  of  the  North  and  East;  the  brown- 
skinned,  lazy  seafaring  races  of  the  Pacific  Island 
world;  and  those  dusky  men  of  southern  and  western 
Asia  whose  haughty  aquiline  features  proclaim  them 
to  be  half-brothers  of  our  own. 

If  you  come  to  Singapore  from  Hongkong  or  Manila, 
you  are  struck  at  once  by  a  black  intruder  upon  the 
familiar  landscape.  As  the  municipal  burden-bearer, 
lean,  polished,  and  clothed  only  in  a  carmine-coloured 
turban,  as  the  money-changer  with  a  feminine  coiffure 
and  skirt  and  a  masculine  beard,  as  the  robed  and  tur- 
baned  proprietor  of  gems  and  tinsel  embroidery,  he 
is  the  distinguishing  feature  of  the  place.  Otherwise 
Singapore  looks  like  any  other  foreign  settlement  in  the 
Eastern  tropics.  There  is  the  Bund,  the  avenue  along 


Out  of  the  jungle  lean-to  swarmed  the  pygmy  people 


There  were  miniature  mothers  and  the  tiniest  babes  I  ever  saw 


I  made  some  research  into  social  conditions  in  the  cosmopolitan 
community  of   Singapore 


We  kept  passing  majestic,  turbaned  figures,  like  ghosts  out  of 
some  old  Bible 


AT  THE  THRESHOLD  OF  INDIA          253 

the  sea-front  where  ladies  with  parasols  and  gentlemen 
in  white  duck  and  sun-helmets  promenade  beneath  the 
palms.  There  is  the  harbour  full  of  great  ships  and 
quaint  little  vessels  from  many  a  jungly  isle  and  croco- 
dile-haunted river.  There  are  the  low,  many-arched  and 
many-windowed  buildings  of  a  tropical  land  gleaming 
white  in  the  sunlight,  or  touched  perhaps  with  a  richer 
glow  of  pink  or  yellow.  There  is  the  casual  light  of  scar- 
let flowers.  It  is  a  picture  compounded  of  familiar  ele- 
ments. 

The  most  interesting  of  all  the  many-coloured  citizens 
of  Singapore  was  the  hero  whom  I  nicknamed  Aladdin. 
He  was  a  noble-looking  creature.  All  day  he  sat  behind 
piles  of  precious  stones — sapphires,  rubies,  garnets,  to- 
pazes, amethysts,  aquamarines,  tourmalines,  and  moon- 
stones— green  sapphires  and  rubies  of  delicate  pink,  and 
aquamarines,  blue  as  the  tropical  sea  or  silvery  pale  as 
the  light  of  tropical  moon,  and  moonstones  that  were 
like  the  morning  fog  with  the  sun  shining  into  it.  When 
I  stopped  to  interview  him,  he  carelessly  scattered  his 
treasures  before  me  like  one  who  had  the  stars  for  play- 
things. But  this  was  only  a  preliminary  greeting.  If 
I  stayed  awhile,  he  grew  confidential.  Gradually  he 
would  produce  from  folds  and  pouches  and  small  secret 
drawers  and  invisible  arcana  about  his  person  little  bits 
of  white  tissue-paper,  each  enfolding  some  special  and 
wonderful  stone,  caressing  them,  polishing  them,  letting 
the  light  flash  into  their  hearts  and  relating  their  his- 
tory and  peculiar  properties.  He  always  offered  these 
treasures  to  ladies  at  cost  price.  He  said  he  scorned  to 
make  a  profit  by  a  lady ;  he  lived  by  cheating  the  gentle- 
men who  buy  jewels  for  ladies. 

So  the  days  passed  at  Singapore,  in  casual  wanderings 
among  the  streets  by  way  of  pastime  and  a  more  steady 


254  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

research  into  the  social  conditions  of  this  cosmopolitan 
community — whose  results  I  cannot  detail  here;  for 
there  soon  came  a  rush  of  events — the  Rubber  King,  and 
the  Road  to  Mandalay — and  beyond  Singapore  another 
and  a  stranger  world. 


CHAPTEK  XXXIII 

THE  RUBBER  KING 

IT  happened  one  evening  that  I  was  dining  at  the  hotel 
with  Mrs.  Robins,  who  had  not  yet  found  a  sailing  to 
Borneo.  Afterwards,  as  we  sat  in  the  open,  palmy  lobby 
looking  out  over  the  sea,  a  burly,  cheerful  youth  joined 
us  and  remarked  affably  without  even  the  formality  of  a 
good  evening:  "Well,  I  have  got  rid  of  those  fellows. 
They  wanted  me  to  play  poker.  I  hate  poker,  don't  you? 
I  thought  I  would  rather  talk  to  you.  May  I  order  you  a 
liqueur?" 

He  seemed  so  much  at  home  that  Mrs.  Robins  and  I 
each  thought  he  must  be  a  friend  of  the  other's.  The 
drink  I  refused  but  she  accepted  it  gracefully.  He  pro- 
ceeded to  give  his  orders  to  a  languid,  turbaned  lackey  in 
accents  unmistakably  American:  "Two  cherry  brandy 
liqueurs,  boy;  and  look  here,  boy,  you  might  just  try  to 
run  a  little.  I  know  you  don't  know  how — 'tisn't  done 
here.  But  just  begin  to  practise  up.  Savvy?  Make 
your  feet  go  chop-chop." 

Then,  settling  down  in  a  chair,  he  volunteered  an  ac- 
count of  his  call  on  the  Sultan  of  Jahore.  He  had  come 
out  here  on  a  flying  trip  to  look  after  the  property  of  the 
Browning  Rubber  Company.  He  was  Browning.  His 
father  had  "mislaid  his  money"  when  this  youth  was  "a 
kid"  and  so  he  had  "lost  out"  on  an  education,  but,  be- 
ginning at  fourteen,  had  succeeded  in  recovering  his 
property. 

He  bought  all  the  rubber  on  the  Sultan's  estates.    "He 

255 


256  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

is  a  nice  old  boy — the  Sultan,"  he  confided  to  us.  "I 
always  respected  him  because  he  has  business  ability — 
which  is  unusual  in  a  ruler.  So  when  I  got  here,  I  just 
sent  him  word  that  I  intended  to  call.  When  I  saw  him, 
I  said :  'Well,  Your  Highness,  what  have  you  got  for  us?' 
And  he  said,  bowing  all  over  the  place:  'A  tiger-hunt.' 
That  got  my  goat.  A  tiger  is  all  right  in  his  sphere,  but 
it  doesn't  do  to  argue  with  him,  'cause  he's  got  a  rotten 
disposition.  So  I  said :  'Look  here,  Your  Highness,  I'll 
tell  you  what  we'll  do.  You  just  go  and  kill  that  tiger 
yourself,  and  when  he's  all  nice  and  dead,  I'll — why,  I'll 
come  around  and  look  at  him.' 

"So  I  merely  stayed  to  tiffin  with  him,  and  he  showed 
me  around  the  palace  and  all  that — nice  little  joint  he 
has  there,  but  I  wouldn't  live  in  it  if  he  gave  it  to  me. 
Afterward  the  Sultan  presented  me  with  the  skin  of  a 
man-eating  tiger — a  beautiful  thing  with  an  absolutely 
perfect  head  and  a  complete  row  of  teeth — nothing  doing 
for  the  dentist  in  that  beast.  I  am  going  to  have  it  put 
in  a  glass  case  with  a  little  brass  sign  saying :  'Presented 
to  J.  A.  Browning  by  the  Sultan  of  Jahore.'  I'll  hang 
it  in  my  parlour  at  home.  Then  every  one  who  sees  it 
will  say :  'Great  old  boy,  that  Browning.  Look  how  he 
gets  on  with  royalty.'  And  I  do,"  he  ended  modestly, 
"I  get  on  fine  with  sultans." 

Then,  fixing  his  cheerful  blue  eyes  on  me,  he  an- 
nounced: "You  know,  I  was  watching  you  all  through 
dinner  and  I  just  made  up  my  mind  I'd  start  in  to  rush 
you.  You  don't  mind,  do  you?  'Cause  when  I  start  after 
a  girl,  I  make  myself  a  regular  nuisance.  I  never  stop 
till  she  just  absolutely  kicks  me  out." 

I  did  not  have  the  slightest  doubt  of  that.  When  he 
took  sultans  by  storm,  what  was  a  mere  girl  to  expect? 
But  I  answered,  "Oh,  no,  I  don't  mind  in  the  least.  Go 


THE  RUBBER  KING  257 

ahead  if  it  amuses  you,"  and  waited  to  see  how  he  would 
proceed. 

His  procedure  was  worthy  of  a  conquerer  of  sultans. 
He  whistled,  and  out  of  the  palmy  darkness,  like  a  magic 
carpet  in  an  Arabian  Nights  tale,  there  rolled  an  elegant 
grey  touring-car,  slender,  graceful,  noiseless  as  some 
beautiful  animal,  with  an  enormous  turbaned  potentate 
in  charge. 

"Rather  nice  little  wagon,  I  think,"  said  the  Rubber 
King,  with  modest  pride.  "I  got  it  for  my  stay  here. 
Thought  you  might  take  a  ride  in  it." 

Mrs.  Robins  rose  to  the  occasion  at  once.  She,  it 
seems,  was  my  official  chaperon.  I  never  knew  it  till 
that  minute.  But  as  my  official  chaperon  she  forthwith 
accepted,  and  I — poor  little  jeune  fille  that  I  was — 
had  nothing  to  say  in  the  matter.  So  I  found  myself 
installed  in  the  car  with  her,  rolling  away — heaven 
knows  where — into  the  scented,  starry  darkness. 

"Now  what  I  want  to  know,"  I  reflected,  "is  whether 
this  is  an  elopement  or  a  movie." 

Above  our  heads  the  palms  were  silhouetted  against 
the  burning  stars.  To  our  right  the  sea  gleamed  wan 
and  silvery  in  the  night,  and  the  waves  broke  lazily 
against  the  sands,  with  the  long,  slow,  soft  swish  that  is 
the  peculiar  music  of  the  sea  on  tropical  shores.  The 
sweetness  and  solemnity  of  the  night  subdued  the  clat- 
tering tongue  of  the  Rubber  King  to  poetry  and  senti- 
ment. 

"The  other  evening,"  he  said  softly,  "when  I  was 
moored  on  the  calm  waters  beneath  the  cocoanut  trees, 
and  I  looked  up  and  saw  those  majestic  palms  against 
the  stars,  and  the  waters  below  all  shining  full  of  stars, 
I  just  said :  'Oh,  God — gee,  but  I'm  glad.'  And  I  guess 
I  was  nearer  praying  than  I've  been  for  a  long  time." 


258  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

As  we  rode  along,  we  kept  passing  majestic  turbaned 
figures  that  seemed  in  the  darkness  like  ghosts  out  of 
some  old  Bible.  One  stopped  and  anxiously  held  up  a 
smoking  torch  right  in  the  face  of  our  headlight,  as  if 
that  would  enable  him  to  see  us. 

"On  my  soul/'  said  the  Rubber  King,  "it's  Diogenes 
with  his  lantern.  Hello,  Di,"  he  continued  affably. 
"How's  the  tub?  Rents  going  up  yet?  Tell  me  when 
you  get  ready  to  take  in  boarders." 

"You  see,"  he  remarked  complacently,  turning  to  me, 
as  the  turban,  torch,  and  draperies  noiselessly  melted 
into  the  night  shadows,  "you  see  I'm  friends  with  all  of 
them." 

He  then  proceeded  to  demonstrate  to  me  how  to  look 
at  tropical  stars.  "The  fact  is,"  he  said,  "that  the  minute 
the  sun  sets,  one  should  abandon  the  vertical  position — 
just  cease  to  be  vertical  and  become  horizontal,  like 
this."  And  I  found  myself  suddenly  seized  and  laid 
out  flat  upon  the  seat,  staring  straight  up  into  a  universe 
of  stars.  "Speed  her  up,  sais,"  he  called  out  to  the 
chauffeur,  and  the  car  leaped  forward  at  a  pace  that 
would  have  landed  her  straight  in  the  police-station  in 
any  civilized  country.  "Now  watch  'em  whiz,"  he  said, 
pinning  me  down  with  his  arms,  while  the  stars  swept 
by  above  like  a  "swirl  of  golden  bees." 

It  was  a  strange  sensation — dizzy,  breathless,  deli- 
cious ;  and  the  whirling  stars  acted  like  a  species  of  hyp- 
notism. I  felt  as  if  my  head  were  dissolving  into  a  series 
of  golden  wheels  and  I  were  spinning  straight  off  into 
space. 

"It's  fine,  isn't  it — Goldilocks?"  he  whispered,  leaning 
over  me  till  his  face  almost  touched  my  hair.  I  tore  my- 
self loose  from  that  starry  enchantment  and  jumped  up- 
right in  the  speeding  car. 


THE  RUBBER  KING  259 

"Yes,  they're  pretty  stars/'  I  answered,  sinking  down 
in  the  seat.  "And  now  Mrs.  Robins  wants  to  go  home.'' 

Obviously  Mrs.  Robins  wanted  nothing  of  the  sort. 
Her  idea  of  the  duties  of  a  chaperon  was  to  enjoy  a 
plutocrat's  incidental  attentions  and  maintain  a  strict 
policy  of  laissez  faire.  But  I  decided  that  in  her  official 
capacity  it  was  now  her  duty  to  want  to  go  home,  and 
I  intended  to  see  that  she  did  it.  The  Rubber  King 
showed  no  signs  of  turning  the  car  around. 

"This  ride,"  he  said,  "is  only  just  begun.  We  are 
going  a  long  ways  yet!" — adding  in  a  tone  which  ex- 
plained how  he  happened  to  be  a  Rubber  King  at  such 
an  early  age:  "When  I  speak,  I  expect  to  be  minded." 

"Yes,  I  know,"  I  answered.  "So  do  I."  And  the  end 
of  it  was  that  in  a  short  time  we  rolled  up  to  the  hotel 
veranda. 

For  some  moments  I  had  been  gravely  silent.  "This,"  I 
was  reflecting,  "is  evidently  a  cave-man,  though  an  inter- 
esting specimen  of  what  my  country  produces.  All  cave- 
men should  be  civilized  or  ostracized  as  soon  as  possible." 
I  was  wondering  which  course  of  treatment  he  required. 

There  are  men  who  can  stand  everything  but  a 
woman's  silence.  He  was  evidently  that  sort.  I  could 
feel  his  nerve  dissolving  by  the  minute.  When  he  said 
good  night,  he  lingered,  making  ridiculous  remarks  to 
Mrs.  Robins  till  I  was  taken  off  my  guard  and  smiled 
at  one  of  them.  "Thanks  for  smiling,"  he  whispered  in 
my  ear.  "More  rushing  to-morrow."  Then  he  was  gone. 

"Poor  soul,"  thought  I,  "he  is  going  to  be  disap- 
pointed." 

And  so  he  was ;  for  by  the  time  he  got  around  with  his 
car  next  afternoon  I  had  discovered  the  Road  to  Manda- 
lay  and  was  one  hundred  miles  out  at  sea.  I  suppose  he 
consoled  himself  by  calling  on  the  Sultan. 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 

ON  THE  ROAD  TO  MANDALAY 

IT  happened  this  way.  Early  next  day  I  set  out  on  my 
daily  round  of  calls  on  the  steamship-companies.  It  was 
a  process  that  was  becoming  automatic.  As  I  stood 
there,  explaining  to  the  clerk  that  it  was  his  duty  to  pro- 
duce a  passage,  a  pleasant  Englishman  who  was  stand- 
ing by  suddenly  said : 

"Would  you  go  on  a  freight-boat?" 

I  protested  my  willingness  to  be  any  kind  of  cargo. 

"There's  quite  a  crowd  of  us,"  he  said,  "who  have 
found  a  boat  from  Christmas  Island  that  they  intend  to 
send  over  to  Eangoon  to-day  with  sugar.  It  starts  in  an 
hour,  and  there's  room  for  one." 

"I  think  I  shall  be  the  one,"  I  answered,  not  knowing 
where  Eangoon  was  nor  at  all  positive  that  I  could  gal- 
vanize the  leisurely  transportation  facilities  of  Singa- 
pore into  getting  me  to  the  boat  in  an  hour. 

Sixty  minutes  later  I  was  launched  for  a  week's  jour- 
ney on  a  silken  sapphire  sea,  so  closely  packed  in  with 
casually  collected  passengers  that  it  seemed  as  if  half 
of  us  would  have  to  hang  ourselves  over  the  side  of  the 
boat  while  the  other  half  turned  around.  The  passen- 
gers consisted  of  two  or  three  highly  differentiated 
ladies,  a  Bushwhacker,  and  half  a  dozen  fresh-faced 
Englishmen  all  cut  from  exactly  the  same  pattern.  We 
were  stowed  away  in  cabins  warranted  to  hold  "two  able- 
bodied  seamen."  These  cabins  were  marvels  of  economy 
in  space,  but  in  that  respect  they  could  not  equal  the 

260 


ON  THE  EOAD  TO  MANDALAY  2«1 

bathroom.  This  was  a  yard  square,  and  furnished  with 
a  jug  of  water  and  a  hole — inclusive.  One  poured  the 
water  over  one's  self,  and  it  ran  down  the  hole,  and  the 
fishes  drank  it.  That  was  one's  bath.  This  scientific 
arrangement  broke  the  ice  for  us.  Scintillating  discus- 
sion of  its  merits  filled  the  ship  as  we  steamed  out  over 
the  blazing  white  waters  of  the  Malacca  Straits. 

It  was  one  long  picnic — that  jolly  company  alone  on 
the  freight-boat  on  the  warm  ocean.  Day  after  day  we 
steamed  under  the  white  sunshine  of  the  equator,  and 
only  the  flying  fish  disturbed  the  motionless  calm  of  the 
waters.  Bonny  creatures  they  were,  like  tiny  birds ;  and 
we  loved  to  watch  their  brave  little  flights.  Night  after 
night  the  sun  dipped  into  the  sea  at  the  end  of  what 
seemed  a  rod  of  flame  across  the  waters,  and  the  moon 
swung  upward  among  stars  strangely  misplaced  on  the 
horizon. 

We  were  bound,  not  directly  for  India,  but  for  Burma, 
and  this  was  the  Eoad  to  Mandalay,  all  of  which  was 
somewhat  dark  to  my  understanding  just  then,  but  I 
trusted  to  the  next  harbour  for  geographical  elucida- 
tions. All  I  knew  of  Mandalay  was  what  Kipling  had 
told  about  the  silken  ladies  who  wasted  their  Christian 
kisses  on  a  heathen  idol's  foot.  That  there  was  much 
more  to  the  silken  ladies  than  that  I  had  yet  to  learn. 
Meanwhile  one  could  not  but  rejoice  in  the  pure  content 
of  existence  beneath  those  skies.  The  soft  caressing  days 
gave  place,  each  sunset  time,  to  the  purer  luxury  of 
night.  Then  came  the  long  evenings  when  the  smooth 
waters  and  the  decks  were  flooded  with  a  warm  and 
magical  whiteness,  and  the  waters  broke  away  from  the 
ship,  sometimes  in  sparkles  of  fire,  but  mostly  in  a  long 
wash  of  feathery  light  that  was  like  the  plumage  of 
shining  birds. 


262  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

One  by  one  in  the  moonlight  strange  figures,  turbaned 
figures  in  flowing  draperies,  stole  out  from  the  depths  of 
the  ship  and  prostrated  themselves,  calmly,  slowly. 
They  were  the  Mohammedan  crew  saying  their  prayers, 
looking  through  the  gleaming  night  to  Mecca. 

Meanwhile  the  Englishmen  improved  their  opportuni- 
ties and  the  moonlight  by  falling  hopelessly  in  love  with 
the  ladies  on  board  for  the  duration  of  the  voyage.  The 
junglewallah,  who  was  returning  from  his  leave  jubi- 
lantly engaged  to  an  Australian  girl,  confined  his  atten- 
tions to  the  boisterous,  buxom  Australian  flapper  on 
board.  He  considered  her  safe,  and,  besides,  the  air 
which  had  reddened  her  round  cheeks  was  the  air  which 
his  beloved  breathed.  He  warned  the  rest  of  us  not  to 
tamper  with  his  dedicated  heart. 

Another  Englishman,  a  bachelor  and  a  gentle  soul,  fell 
softly,  quietly,  and  unobtrusively  in  love  with  the  fair 
young  English  wife  and  her  little  girl,  who  looked  like  a 
pallid  baby  angel.  Mother  and  child  shared  his  renun- 
ciatory devotion  equally.  As  the  voyage  continued,  a 
melancholy  settled  upon  him,  pensive  as  the  tropical 
moonlight  in  which  he  paced  back  and  forth  each  night 
on  deck,  long  after  the  rest  of  us  were  occupying  the 
bunks  of  the  able-bodied  seamen.  Not  even  the  daily 
romp  with  the  flapper  whom  every  one  teased  and  with 
whom  every  last  man  of  them  carried  on  an  uproarious 
flirtation  could  dispel  the  gentle  influence. 

The  one  flaw  in  the  good  fellowship  of  those  days  was 
the  Bushwhacker.  The  Bushwhacker  discovered  in 
"Miss  U.  S.  A."  his  ideal.  All  his  life,  it  seemed,  he  had 
been  searching  for  his  ideal,  and  now  he  had  found  her 
afloat  on  that  little  grey  tub.  It  is  really  inconvenient  to 
be  an  ideal  when  one  cannot  get  more  than  ten  feet  away 


ON  THE  KOAD  TO  MANDALAY  263 

from  the  worshipper.  But  he  said  it  was  the  love  of  his 
life.  He  told  every  one  so. 

He  did  not  in  the  least  resemble  the  usual  type  of  the 
Bushwhacker.  He  was  small  and  anemic  and  preter- 
naturally  young.  Afterward  we  discovered  that  he  was 
nearly  sixty,  but  he  looked  thirty.  He  derived  his 
standards  of  life  from  diligent  attendance  on  the  musical 
comedies  from  the  United  States  which  sometimes  in- 
vade Australia.  He  cherished  what  he  believed  to  be  an 
American  twang,  and  a  snappy  American  style. 

But  alas !  His  notions  of  what  was  expected  of  a  man 
of  the  world  were  those  of  the  music-hall.  For  six  days 
and  six  moonlit  evenings  he  laid  his  heart,  his  hand,  and 
all  that  was  his  at  the  feet  of  Miss  U.  S.  A.,  and  the 
prospect  of  a  new  and  brilliant  start  in  life  in  South 
Africa.  On  the  seventh,  as  we  sat  outside  of  Rangoon, 
his  conscience  forced  him  to  mention  a  little  impediment. 
He  already  had  a  wife  and  six  children ! 

The  morning  after  the  Bushwhacker's  revelations,  I 
was  awakened  by  a  masculine  voice  singing  out :  "Oh,  I 
say,  America,  if  you  don't  tumble  out  pretty  quick,  you'll 
find  yourself  in  Mandalay.  Rangoon's  right  outside 
the  window." 

I  looked  through  the  porthole.  We  were  sliding  up  a 
yellow  river.  The  white  houses  on  the  low  green  shores 
were  rosy  in  the  dawn.  A  boat  came  alongside — such  a 
boat  as  we  would  call  in  China  a  junk.  It  was  manipu- 
lated by  polished  black  skeletons  clothed  only  in  white 
turbans.  Another  boat,  which  turned  up  at  the  ends  like 
a  mediaeval  shoe,  was  bobbing  about,  full  of  red  turbans 
that  shone  like  garnets  in  the  sunlight. 

"This,"  I  thought,  "is  India,"  and  felt  well  content 
with  the  vision.  I  learned  later  that  it  was  not  India, 


264  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

but  Burma,  and  that  there  is  a  vast  difference.  But  for 
the  moment  it  looked  like  Kipling  to  me,  and  therefore 
to  my  eyes  it  was  authentic. 

Then  something  blazed  upon  the  landscape — a  gleam- 
ing rebuke  to  English  roof-tops,  like  the  architecture  of 
clouds  in  the  dawn.  It  grew  upon  my  eyes;  it  expanded 
like  a  miracle  till  it  dominated  all  the  sunshine — a  daz- 
zle of  airy  spires  and  glittering  towers,  pure  gold  in  the 
light  of  the  morning.  This  was  the  Shwe  Dagon  pagoda, 
and  I  had  seen  it  at  its  most  glorious  moment  when  all 
its  jewelled  pinnacles  flash  into  life  and  radiance  at  the 
touch  of  dawn. 

Our  ship  had  now  come  to  rest  at  the  foot  of  the  steps, 
and  in  a  few  minutes  I  was  part  of  a  shining  and  palmy 
landscape  adorned  with  most  gorgeous  figures  of  human- 
ity. There  were,  of  course,  the  foreign  office  buildings, 
and  the  miscellaneous  collection  of  men  of  all  colours 
which  throng  the  streets  of  an  Oriental  metropolis,  domi- 
nated by  a  few  pallid  lords  of  creation  who  wore  ugly 
white  suits  and  looked  as  if  they  were  made  of  dough. 
In  this,  Rangoon  differed  from  no  other  tropical  city. 
But  they  were  but  excrescences  amidst  a  more  joyous 
population  clothed,  men  and  women  alike,  in  petticoats 
of  rainbow-coloured  silks,  fluttering  and  chattering  in 
groups  at  the  feet  of  alabaster  Buddhas  and  beneath  the 
airy  gold  of  pagoda  spires.  A  people  rather  Mongolian 
than  Indian,  and  attached  to  the  empire  of  India  only 
within  the  last  half  century,  the  Burmese  have  made  a 
blithe  addition  to  that  rather  gloomy  realm.  Something 
of  their  charm  they  owe  to  the  natural  wealth  of  their 
land,  and  something  to  the  unique  freedom  of  their 
women.  But  the  obvious  source  of  their  joy  is  Buddha. 
Buddhism  is  the  national  amusement.  Being  a  light- 
hearted,  indolent,  and  graceful  people,  the  Burmese  have 


I    ascended    through    the   golden    gates    into    the    heart   of   that 
templed  world 


The  carved  and  gilded  shrines  were  delicate  as  lace  embroidered 

with  gems 


The  bronze  monks  walked  by  twos  and  threes  within  the 
temple  courts 


Amidst  the  flowers  and  candles  of  the  pagoda,  he  caught  the 
flirtatious  glance  of  a  dainty,  saffron  maid 


ON  THE  ROAD  TO  MANDALAY  205 

made  of  their  religion  a  bright  and  pretty  thing.  They 
cover  the  landscape  with  pagodas  like  toy-houses  and  re- 
joice in  merry  childlike  ceremonies  in  honour  of  alabas- 
ter Buddhas  which  are  to  them  like  heavenly  pets.  80 
on  that  first  morning,  while  the  Madrassi  was  driving 
an  anxious  Englishman  to  his  office,  and  the  naked  Tamil 
was  running  hither  and  thither  with  the  burdens  of 
Burma  on  his  back,  and  the  lordly  Sikh  was  guarding 
the  peace  of  the  realm,  and  the  lean  Bengali  was  selling 
the  fruit  of  the  land  in  the  bazaar,  the  Burmese  them- 
selves— merry,  suave  and  clothed  like  the  flowers  of 
spring — were  trooping  to  the  temples  to  gossip  at  the 
feet  of  Buddha,  and  play  awhile  with  candles  and  sweet- 
smelling  flowers. 

Yet  the  full  gaiety  of  their  faith  I  scarcely  appreciated 
till  I  came  into  the  pagoda  courts.  The  pagoda  is  such  a 
wonder  as  the  gods  themselves  could  not  make.  A  great 
central  dome  of  gold,  capping  a  hill,  and  surrounded  by 
circle  upon  circle  of  lesser  shrines,  all  golden  and  jew- 
elled too,  it  seems  a  thing  which  an  enterprising 
god  might  well  translate  to  the  Heavens  where  it  could 
light  the  world  and  outface  the  sun. 

Late  in  the  afternoon  I  joined  the  prismatic  stream  of 
colour  which  ascended  through  the  golden  gates,  and 
climbed  into  the  heart  of  that  templed  world.  It  was 
like  walking  straight  into  glory -land.  There  was  an  end- 
less forest  of  carved  and  gilded  shrines  which  seemed  to 
be  made  of  lace  embroidered  in  gems.  In  the  shadowed 
spaces  overhung  with  carving  like  the  branches  of  trees 
were  the  dwelling-places  of  alabaster  Buddhas  in  rai- 
ment of  gold. 

Before  every  god  and  godling  the  candles  burned. 
They  starred  this  golden  forest  like  fireflies  above  a  field 
of  flowers.  Above  the  gold,  the  gems,  the  candles,  and 


266  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  white  Buddhas  was  the  glory  of  the  flowers.  The 
flowers  were  everywhere,  some  white  as  the  enshrined 
divinities,  some  yellow  like  the  robes  of  the  bronze 
monks  who  walked  by  twos  and  threes  within  the  temple- 
courts.  They  were  piled  on  flower-stands;  they  were 
sold  by  dusky  Indian  children  clothed  only  in  beads, 
who  pattered  after  us  teasing  us  to  buy,  and  had  to  be 
admonished  in  strong  language.  The  accumulated 
blossoms  of  many  worshippers  were  piled  high  before 
the  altars;  the  candles  shone  softly  among  them;  and 
the  incense  mingled  with  their  fresh  perfume.  Mean- 
while the  light,  the  glitter,  and  the  colour  were  all  re- 
flected in  the  marble  pavements  that  had  been  made 
smooth  by  the  passing  of  many  feet.  The  pavements 
reflected  everything,  not  clearly  and  sharply  but  vaguely, 
like  moving  forms  and  sunset  colours  mirrored  in  ice. 
But  the  dim  suggestion  of  starry  inverted  spires  and 
moving  gleams  of  colour  and  lines  of  light  in  the  pave- 
ment below  gave  to  it  all  the  last  touch  of  unreality — 
made  it  seem  only  a  fairy-scene,  ephemeral  as  the  bright 
worlds  that  seem  to  lie  among  the  evening  clouds. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

WHERE  EVE  IS  THE  GENTLEMAN 

When  Adam  delved,  and  Eve  she  span, 
Who  was  then  the  gentleman? 

was  a  legend  on  the  mug  from  which  I  used  to  imbibe 
my  milk  and  my  earliest  social  ideals.  I  confess  the 
question  puzzled  me.  But  when  I  came  to  Burma,  I 
thought  I  had  found  the  answer.  The  gentleman  was 
the  lady  of  Burma.  For  she  adds  to  a  capitalistic  su- 
premacy that  is  masculine,  the  graces  of  a  very  flower 
of  leisure. 

Just  as  every  Western  boy  is  supposed  to  graduate 
from  school  into  a  self-supporting  job,  so  every  Burmese 
girl  is  expected  at  adolescence  to  grow  into  a  little  busi- 
ness of  her  own.  It  may  be  weaving,  the  weaving  of 
those  heavy  checked  silks  of  yellow  and  green  and  purple 
and  rose-colour  in  which  the  Burmese  men  and  women 
go  clad  like  Solomon  in  his  glory.  It  may  even  be  agri- 
culture. But  it  is  most  likely  to  be  small  shop-keeping. 
If  she  isn't  very  ambitious,  she  keeps  a  shop  in  her 
own  house.  Nearly  every  village  house  offers  something 
to  sell — cheroots  or  beetle  nuts  or  even  small  amber 
ornaments.  And  in  the  morning,  before  the  sun  gets  too 
hot  for  active  motion,  all  her  neighbours  saunter  in  and 
enjoy  an  exchange  of  gossip  in  the  interludes  of  lei- 
surely bargaining.  A  lady  with  a  talent  for  speech 
and  affairs  gathers  up  all  the  news  of  the  village  and 
hands  it  over  with  the  simple  purchases,  and  tells  her 
fellow-citizens  just  what  ought  to  be  done  in  the  village. 

267 


f 
268  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Men  in  silk  skirts,  with  scarfs  tied  like  hair-ribbons 
around  their  heads,  gather  around  her  little  stall,  sitting 
on  their  heels,  and  idly  nod  assent  over  their  cheroots, 
while  she  lays  down  the  law.  No  soap-box  for  her.  She 
keeps  a  perpetual  open  forum  in  her  own  house. 

If  her  ambitions  have  a  wider  range,  she  takes  a  stall 
in  the  bazaar,  and  carries  thither  her  commercial 
shrewdness  and  her  lively  tongue  to  play  upon  larger 
audiences.  Sometimes  she  takes  her  husband  or  her 
father  along,  but  in  a  subordinate  capacity.  A  girl's 
father  is  expected  to  start  her  in  her  own  career  and  her 
husband  to  help  her  to  maintain  it,  but  the  rights,  the 
profits,  and  the  full  directorship  of  it  are  hers;  and  a 
very  considerable  portion  of  the  industrial  and  commer- 
cial enterprise  of  Burma  is  in  the  hands  of  women. 

The  day  after  my  arrival  I  went  into  a  cheroot  factory. 
It  was  an  extensive  place,  comprising  several  shacklike 
buildings — clean  and  orderly — where  many  girls  were 
busy  adroitly  rolling  the  green  leaves  into  long  cigars. 
It  seemed  to  be  in  charge  of  a  man,  who  spoke  English 
with  an  American  accent,  and  had,  he  confessed,  once 
lived  in  Chicago.  We  went  through  the  plant  asking 
many  questions.  At  first  he  answered  clearly  enough. 
But  finally  he  said :  "I  think  I  will  have  to  refer  you  to 
my  daughter.  You  know  this  is  her  factory,  and  she 
can  tell  you  about  it.  I  merely  work  with  her."  And 
when  we  were  ushered  into  the  presence  of  the  real  capi- 
talist, the  intellect  whose  brain  had  built  up  the  business 
— we  found  a  pretty  little  thing  in  a  green  silk  petticoat, 
sitting  on  a  table  and  smoking  a  cigar  a  foot  long. 

When  a  girl  marries,  she  retains  her  business  and  her 
independent  income.  Probably,  on  the  whole,  Burmese 
women  contribute  more  than  the  men  to  the  main- 
tenance of  the  household.  The  property  that  she  brings 


WHERE  EVE  IS  THE  GENTLEMAN       209 

and  her  own  earnings  are  guaranteed  to  her  for  her  chil- 
dren. Her  economic  independence  of  her  husband  gives 
her  freedom  through  all  the  range  of  her  activity.  Few 
strings  are  tied  to  Burmese  femininity  at  any  time. 
The  girl  arranges  her  own  marriage,  though  not  without 
the  chaperonage  and  approval  of  her  parents.  Wooing 
is  almost  as  free  as  it  is  in  America.  Often  young  people 
elope  and,  after  a  brief  honeymoon  in  some  jungly  place, 
come  back  to  be  forgiven,  like  any  foolish  young  folk, 
and  are  received  with  indulgence  in  the  easy-going  com- 
munity. If  a  girl  is  not  satisfied  in  her  marriage,  if  her 
husband  does  not  treat  her  fairly,  she  may  go  before  the 
elders  of  the  village  and  present  her  case,  and  obtain  a 
release.  There  is  no  question  of  alimony.  She  has  sup- 
ported herself  throughout.  She  simply  takes  her  own 
property  and  goes,  and  the  distribution  of  the  children 
is  arranged  by  arbitration  and  compromise  to  every 
one's  satisfaction.  But,  despite  this  freedom  of  divorce, 
family  life  in  Burma  is  perhaps  more  faithful  and  whole- 
some than  in  most  Oriental  lands,  and  the  Encyclopedia 
Britannica  solemnly  records  that  "Burmese  children  are 
adored  by  their  parents  and  are  said  to  be  the  happiest 
and  merriest  children  in  the  world." 

If  there  are  any  objections  to  this  simple  form  of  femi- 
nism, they  do  not  appear  in  Burma.  Among  the 
women  the  standard  of  health  and  literacy  is  higher  than 
in  India  and  China,  and  they  contrive  to  be  immensely 
gay  and  ornamental  in  the  midst  of  their  labours. 
Parading  the  streets  on  the  way  to  the  temple  in  the 
afternoon,  in  their  fresh  white  silk  jackets  and  bright 
silk  petticoats  and  scarfs,  laughing  and  flirting  and  ex- 
pressing their  opinions  on  all  public  matters  as  they  pass 
by,  often  with  a  procession  of  black-eyed  children  in  tow 
who  are  everybody's  pets — they  have  captured  the  heart 


270  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  almost  every  white  man  who  has  come  their  way. 
Yet  nowhere,  perhaps,  does  the  white  man's  casual  way 
of  taking  to  himself  a  temporary  wife  in  the  East  work 
less  hardship  to  the  woman.  In  Burma  she  occupies  a 
position  too  economically  and  socially  secure  to  be  easily 
wrecked. 

Yet  the  questions  of  life  that  are  so  simple  to  her  are 
a  bit  more  disconcerting  to  the  men  who  come  from 
countries  where  women  are  more  dependent. 

To  the  Burmese  girl  the  Englishman's  reactions  are 
somewhat  complex.  Of  all  the  dusky  ladies  in  his  do- 
minions, he  likes  her  best.  She  is  more  like  an  Occi- 
dental woman,  more  interesting  as  a  person.  But  per- 
haps on  that  very  account,  he  often  develops  a  conscience 
in  dealing  with  her  that  she  scarcely  understands.  I 
learned  of  one  such,  through  a  sensible  little  missionary 
woman  who  cited  him  as  an  example  of  moral  problems 
that  arise  with  the  mingling  of  two  cultures. 

He  was  a  nice,  rosy  English  lad,  just  out  from  home, 
still  conscious  of  his  mother's  prayers  and  admonitions, 
and  determined  upon  the  path  of  rectitude.  One  after- 
noon, amidst  the  flowers  and  candles  of  the  pagoda,  he 
caught  the  flirtatious  glance  of  a  dainty  little  saffron 
maid,  and  lingered,  waiting  for  another  such — and  came 
next  day  for  a  repetition  of  the  experience;  and  on  the 
day  following  that  stationed  himself  by  the  great  alabas- 
ter Buddha  where,  in  prostrating  herself,  she  would  be 
at  his  feet.  When  she  saw  him  there,  she  moved  to  an- 
other place,  but  a  blush  burned  on  her  brown  bare  neck 
and  her  eyes  were  shy  and  suffused  beneath  his  glance. 
It  had  been  her  custom  to  leave  early,  before  the  twinkle 
of  all  the  golden  shrines  went  dead  and  cold  in  the 
twilight.  But  that  day  she  lingered  on,  and  when,  one 
by  one,  the  worshippers  slipped  away  for  the  supper 


WHERE  EVE  IS  THE  GENTLEMAN        271 

hour,  he  moved  to  a  place  beside  her,  in  the  dim  corner 
of  the  temple,  where,  for  the  moment,  only  the  alabaster- 
Buddha  kept  watch  and  even  before  his  passionless, 
marble  face  her  candle  was  now  burning  low.  So  they 
sat  there  on  the  marble  floor,  side  by  side.  When  she 
made  a  move  as  if  to  leave,  the  Englishman  put  out  both 
arms  in  the  dusk  to  hold  her.  "Dear  little  girl,"  he 
whispered  in  his  own  tongue,  and  found  her  throbbing 
and  trembling  in  his  arms. 

But  she  was  a  good  girl,  honest  and  self-respecting, 
and  she  said  it  should  be  a  marriage.  Many  Englishmen 
had  married  Burmese  girls.  When  she  spoke,  he  realized 
that  it  was  not  a  ceremony  binding  on  him,  nor  one 
recognized  in  his  country.  And  dazzled,  whispering  to 
himself  that  he  was  still  free — it  merely  satisfied  her— 
yet  troubled  and  feeling  like  a  cad  because  he  was  de- 
ceiving her,  he  was  recognized  as  her  husband  by  the 
Burmese  community.  According  to  every  law  and  cus- 
tom of  her  native  country  she  was  now  married.  If 
they  should  wish  to  separate,  it  would  be  nothing  to 
worry  about.  Divorce  would  be  as  simple  as  the  wedding, 
and,  with  the  gaiety  of  her  land,  she  seized  on  the  pres- 
ent, and  went  on  with  her  commercial  transactions  in  the 
bazaar,  a  joyous  and  contented  woman.  And  when  the 
first  little  son  came,  and  his  eyes  were  dark  like  hers, 
but  his  skin  white,  she  was  very  happy  indeed,  for  white 
skin  is  greatly  valued  in  Burma. 

Meanwhile  the  young  Englishman  was  content  enough 
with  his  wife.  As  such  arrangements  go  in  the  East,  it 
seemed  all  that  could  be  desired.  She  was  a  busy  and 
merry  little  thing,  who  looked  clean  and  fresh  in  her 
gay  silks,  made  few  demands  on  him,  and  adapted  her- 
self readily  to  his  customs.  But  always  his  conscience 
whispered  that  it  was  a  lie.  He  was  letting  her  be- 


272  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

lieve  herself  married,  when,  by  his  law,  there  was  no 
contract  at  all,  and  she  could  make  no  legal  claim  upon 
him.  At  last,  though  he  knew  that  this  had  never  been 
love  as  an  Occidental  hopes  to  know  it,  he  came  to  the 
decision  that  he  ought  to  many  her  properly,  with  a 
church  ceremony.  \Yhen  he  told  her  this,  as  one  making 
a  great  reparation,  expecting  gratitude  for  his  self- 
sacrifice,  she  received  the  offer  indifferently.  Her  own 
laws  were  quite  good  enough,  she  said.  What  did  she 
want  with  his  gods? 

"But  do  you  know  that  you  are  not  really  my  wife? 
You  are  living  as  a  - 

"I  know  your  vile  English  terms,"  she  said,  hotly.  "I 
am  faithful  to  you,  and  am  your  wife  by  my  laws.  That 
is  enough." 

"But  suppose  I  go  to  England  and  marry  there?" 

"Then  you  go,  and  you  and  I  are  released — and  before 
that,  too,  if  you  wish." 

"But  you  can  inherit  none  of  my  property." 

"I  have  my  own  property." 

"But  the  children?" 

"If  by  your  laws  you  are  not  my  husband,  then  are 
they  not  mine,  and  I  and  my  family  may  have  them. 
And  that  is  what  I  want  most." 

She  was  obdurate.  She  would  have  no  English  mar- 
riage. She  was  a  free  and  self-supporting  woman,  and, 
fatherless  or.  not,  the  children  were  worth  all  they  cost 
her.  But  he  was  still  very  young  and  simple,  and  the 
teaching  that  good  Christian  parents  must  give  their 
boys  was  still  fresh  in  his  heart  and  illustrated  by  little 
worldly  experience.  Somehow  in  his  eyes  there  was  a 
stain  upon  her.  Sometimes  he  thought  he  did  not  deserve 
her,  because  he  had  established  this  little  household 
under  false  pretences.  At  other  times  he  could  not  but 


WHERE  EVE  IS  THE  GENTLEMAN        273 

think  vulgarly  of  her  for  standing  in  this  unhallowed 
relation  to  himself,  and,  in  his  harsh,  bitter,  self- 
accusing,  religious  moods,  the  Bible  supplied  him  with  a 
name  to  call  her. 

"I  was  his  confidant/'  said  the  little  American  mis- 
sionary who  told  me  all  this,  "through  all  his  torture  of 
conscience." 

"And  what  happened  finally?'' 

"It  is  a  difficult  thing  to  tell  and  I  know  it  only 
through  gossip,"  she  replied  reluctantly,  and  then, 
with  as  much  reserve  as  possible,  detailed  the  facts. 
At  last,  driven  to  desperation  by  his  own  scruples,  he  had 
resigned  her,  telling  her  that  it  was  for  her  own  sake, 
that  he  was  not  "treating  her  right,"  all  of  which,  of 
course,  she  did  not  understand.  Hurt,  vexed  with  what 
seemed  to  her  the  unnecessary  misery  he  was  making, 
she  nevertheless  accepted  the  separation  with  dignity, 
reflecting  that  at  least  the  children — of  whom  there  were 
now  two — were  worth  the  price.  Her  father  was  quite 
ready  to  fulfil  all  paternal  duties  to  the  little  ones  and  to 
his  house  she  returned.  That,  to  her  mind,  was  the 
end  of  it. 

But  that  was  not  the  end  of  it  for  him.  He  was  young 
and  hot-blooded,  and  the  conscience  he  brought  out  from 
England  was  a  misfit  in  this  land — as  much  among  his 
white  companions  as  among  the  native  girls.  One  night, 
when  his  moral  sense  was  temporarily  beaten  down  by 
whiskey  and  soda  and  the  jests  of  his  friends  at  dinner, 
and  he  was  feeling  much  in  need  of  a  feminine  creature, 
he  had  found  his  way  to  her — "just — just — as  if  she 
were  a — a  common  woman,"  said  the  little  missionary, 
coming  to  the  point  with  difficulty. 

"And  then?" 

"You    understand.      She   had   felt   herself    his   wife 


274  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

legally  and  in  a  decent  way.  Now,  after  a  separation, 
for  him  to  come  to  her  addressing  her  like  a  prostitute — 
it  was  as  much  an  insult  as  it  would  be  to  you  or  me. 
Well," — she  hesitated,  and  then  went  on.  "There  is  no 
use  going  into  further  details.  She  and  her  kinsmen,  by 
devious  ways  known  to  the  Burmese  when  they  are 
really  aroused,  managed  to  make  it  seem  wisest  to  him 
to  leave  the  town — and  that  is  as  much  as  I  know.  But 
her  children  are  the  brightest  lads  in  these  parts,  and  she 
is  going  to  send  them  to  an  English  college." 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 

CARUSO 

MY  researches  into  Burmese  feminism  were  brought  to 
an  abrupt  close  by  news  of  a  sailing  across  the  Bay  of 
Bengal  to  India.  Once  more  the  scene  shifted  to  the  sea. 
In  some  respects  that  brief  voyage  of  three  days  was  the 
most  adventurous  of  all  the  marine  episodes  of  this  tale. 

In  the  first  place  my  very  presence  on  the  ship  proved 
to  be  a  faux  pas.  Before  I  had  been  there  an  hour,  the 
word  went  round  that  I  was  the  only  woman  on  board. 
The  ship  was  buzzing.  How  would  I  act?  Was  I  really 
a  nice  girl?  One  man,  with  more  curiosity  than  man- 
ners, after  plying  me  with  compliments  and  questions 
which  he  believed  to  be  camouflaged  in  sugar,  looked  me 
in  the  eyes  and  asked : 

"How  long  have  you  been  in  the  secret  service  of  your 
country?" 

"Oh,  not  long,"  said  I,  "not  a  year." 

Some  of  my  new  shipmates  were  inclined  to  be  sorry 
for  ma  I  must  be  very  embarrassed,  they  thought. 
Probably  I  would  bashfully  retire  to  my  cabin  for  the 
duration  of  the  voyage  and  eat  my  meals  only  in  the 
safe  company  of  myself.  A  really  delicate-minded 
female  does  this  now  and  then.  Whenever  I  appeared,  I 
could  feel  my  face  being  scanned  for  blushes. 

All  this  seemed  a  tempest  in  a  teapot.  Women  had 
obviously  travelled  on  this  ship  before,  and  there  was 
every  provision  for  their  comfort  and  privacy.  The 
British  flag  aloft  was  a  guarantee  that  the  conditions  of 
a  civilized  state  prevailed  beneath  it.  The  difficulty  was 

275 


276  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

purely  psychological.  Had  I  not  learned  to  pay  no  at- 
tention to  purely  psychological  difficulties,  I  should  not 
now  be  abroad  in  a  womanless  ship  among  the  sharks 
and  the  flying-fish. 

By  evening  I  was  a  belle.  I  say  this  without  apologies. 
No  woman  could  have  helped  it.  She  might  be  fat,  fifty, 
and  homely,  but  if  she  were  alone  among  white  men  who 
had  not  talked  to  a  woman  of  their  own  colouring  and 
speech  for  months,  like  many  of  the  men  on  board,  she 
would  have  felt  as  irresistible  as  Helen. 

But,  after  all,  it  proved  to  be  a  false  alarm.  My  "too 
distinguished  onliness"  lasted  no  longer  than  next  morn- 
ing. Then  two  other  ladies  were  discovered  aboard  and 
elevated  to  a  place  on  the  throne.  One  was  a  humble  lit- 
tle Salvation  Army  lass  travelling  third  with  the  natives. 
She  had  blue  eyes  and  a  kind,  pallid,  worn  little  face. 
She  was  soon  a  sister  to  the  whole  ship,  and  had  the  free- 
dom of  first  class.  I  think  she  darned  not  a  few  socks, 
and  I  know  that  she  prayed  for  all  of  her  adorers  and 
with  not  a  few  of  them.  These  ministrations  were  re- 
ceived with  the  touching  reverence  that  greeted  other 
feminine  pecularities  on  this  ship. 

The  other  was  all  that  the  Salvation  Army  lass  was 
not.  She  was  an  Armenian  flapper,  not  more  than  six- 
teen, travelling  with  her  father,  a  rich  and  cultivated 
Armenian  Jew.  At  first  she  was  rather  shy,  but  under 
the  deluge  of  masculine  attention  she  blossomed  like  a 
spring-flower  beneath  the  first  rains  and  queened  it  with 
gipsylike  grace  over  the  whole  ship.  Every  trip  around 
the  deck,  every  whispered  conference  on  the  couch  in 
the  writing-room,  every  compliment  and  bow,  brought 
new  bloom  to  her  cheeks  and  more  stars  into  her  eyes, 
and  elicited  a  fresh  ribbon  and  another  bangle  from 
some  inexhaustible  treasure-trove  in  her  cabin. 


CARUSO  277 

By  the  time  I  discovered  these  my  colleagues  in 
sovereignty  I  was  rather  glad  thus  to  be  reinforced.  An 
incident  had  happened  which  rather  dampened  my  cour- 
age— but  of  this  more  anon. 

The  men  among  whom  we  queened  it  were  typical  of 
the  groups  one  is  likely  to  meet  outside  the  big  settle- 
ments in  India.  All  of  them  were  Englishmen.  In  ap- 
pearance most  of  them  were  rather  damaged  by  the  light 
of  a  sun  their  skins  were  never  made  for,  and  were  either 
lean,  brown,  and  wrinkled,  or  rather  flabby  and  florid. 
Several  of  them  wore  the  military  working  uniform 
consisting  of  flannel  shirt  and  "shorts."  ("Shorts"  are 
abbreviated  trousers  which  leave  the  knees  bare  and  are 
calculated  to  rob  the  wearer  of  every  vestige  of  human 
and  military  dignity. )  Some  of  them  were  younger  sons 
with  stray  memories  of  university  days  still  clinging 
about  them  and  a  taste  for  French  novels.  Some  were 
salesmen  who  had  been  distributing  typewriters  and 
automobiles  on  the  borders  of  civilization.  Some  were 
tea-planters  from  the  big  estates  in  the  North.  Some 
had  been  chasing  dacoits — robbers  and  rebels — in  the 
jungles  of  Burma.  Some  had  been  administering  the 
justice  of  England  from  tent  and  horseback  in  the  wil- 
derness. Several  of  them  had  wives  in  England.  Others 
were  going  to  families  in  Calcutta.  But  most  of  them 
merely  cherished  some  worn  little  photograph  of  a  girl 
at  home,  and  a  reminiscent  romance  that  bade  fair  never 
to  materialize. 

Among  these  lonely  ones  I  soon  became  aware  of  a 
psychology  common  enough  among  the  cowboys  of  the 
West  or  among  the  soldiers  in  the  trenches  but  intensi- 
fied and  somewhat  poisoned  by  the  conditions  of  the 
tropics.  It  is  the  psychology  of  men  who  have  long  been 
denied  any  normal  association  with  women — whose 


278  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

natural  interest  in  them  has  not  been  diffused  as  in 
civilized  life  in  a  multitude  of  casual  contacts  and  affec- 
tionate responsibilities.  Among  exiles  it  is  intensified 
by  sheer  homesickness.  Even  a  rather  disreputable  fel- 
low may  learn,  through  the  long  days  of  loneliness  on 
the  prairie,  the  jungle,  or  the  mountain-ridge,  to  enshrine 
his  mother,  his  sisters,  and  the  sweethearts  of  his  early 
youth  in  adoring  tenderness  and  respect.  They  may 
have  been  very  commonplace  little  persons, — these  hero- 
ines of  his, — and  had  he  lived  among  them,  he  would 
have  found  them  so.  But  in  the  perspective  of  wistful 
memory  they  gather  to  themselves  the  charm  of  all  that 
is  denied  and  go  haloed  in  sanctity  and  grace.  The  chiv- 
alry of  the  Americans  has  its  origin  in  the  psychology 
of  the  homeless  frontier. 

But  loneliness  does  not  turn  men  into  saints.  And  a 
man  who  emerges  from  the  desert  or  jungle  for  brief  re- 
cuperation in  the  settlements — with  a  picture  of  some 
good  woman  perhaps  enshrined  like  a  saint  in  his  heart 
— comes  mostly  with  the  determination  to  compound  for 
long  loneliness  by  deliberate  license.  The  pressure  of 
this  intention  is  obvious  under  the  ofttimes  touching 
generosity  with  which  these  men  pour  out  their  hearts 
and  their  savings  at  the  feet  of  the  first  woman  who 
happens  to  cross  their  path. 

The  special  malady  of  the  womanless  frontier  was  no- 
ticeable in  two  or  three  men  on  board  the  ship.  One 
could  recognize  their  somewhat  abnormal  mental  state 
by  the  doglike  way  in  which  they  picked  up  a  few  crumbs 
of  a  woman's  favour,  by  their  feverish  interest  in  her 
dress  and  her  looks  and  all  that  she  did,  and  by  their  dis- 
position to  pour  out  all  their  hearts  in  confidences  about 
their  sweethearts,  their  past,  and  their  most  intimate 
modes  of  life.  One  of  them — a  nervous,  brown,  bashful 


CAKUSO  279 

creature,  who  had  sat  by  me  in  the  brief  fire  of  the  trop- 
ical sunset  and  had  told  me  about  all  the  loves  of  his  life- 
time— came  around  after  dinner  to  cancel  his  engage- 
ment to  walk  with  me  between  nine  and  ten. 

"I  traded  my  date  off  to  Caruso,"  he  said.  "Poor  chap, 
he  needs  you  even  more  than  I  do." 

I  am  sorry  to  say  that  he  took  to  whiskey  and  soda  as  a 
substitute.  We  met  his  unsteady  shadow  afterward  in 
the  darkness  of  the  deck. 

"You  got  the  girl — nothing  for  me  but  whiskey,"  he 
said  to  Caruso.  "Take  care  of  her — goo'  girl,  goo'  girl." 
And  he  went  off  staggering  and  murmuring  into  the 
night. 

Caruso  (so  called  because  he  could  sing  in  a  passion- 
ate and  lyrical  tenor  that  was  strangely  touching)  was 
a  huge  fellow  with  the  build  of  Hercules,  a  childlike  face, 
and  eager,  ingenuous,  suffering  eyes.  His  wife  had  taken 
her  two  children  to  England  for  their  education,  and 
had  no  apparent  intention  of  returning  to  him.  I  think 
she  must  have  been  one  of  those  women  who  lose  interest 
in  a  husband  when  they  have  children  to  divert  their 
affection. 

He  had  been  spending  four  months  alone  on  his  tea- 
estates  in  Assam,  with  only  the  servants  for  company- 
part  of  that  time  beneath  the  black  and  storm-whipped 
sky  of  the  terrible  rainy  season.  His  memories  had  fed 
on  themselves,  till  he  was  like  a  man  haunted  by  the 
dead,  reduced  to  a  helpless  passion  of  self-pity. 

When  he  came  around  to  claim  me  for  the  evening 
stroll,  he  poured  out  the  whole  history  of  his  life,  just 
the  story  of  any  man's  loves  and  hopes  and  disappoint- 
ments, but  full  of  details  which  one  does  not  usually  tell, 
except,  perhaps,  to  whisper  them  into  the  ear  of  love. 
Loneliness  and  long  silence  had  worn  away  the  garment 


280  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  reticence  with  which  we  cover  our  naked  souls.  There 
was  something  almost  uncanny  in  that  intimate,  pas- 
sionate outpouring  in  the  warm  darkness.  One  by  one 
the  wandering  shadows  of  men  ceased  to  pass  us  on  the 
deck.  The  throb  of  the  ship,  like  the  throbbing  of  some 
great  heart,  seemed  to  become  steadier  and  more  har- 
monious as  we  plunged  onward  through  the  shadows  of 
the  sea.  Only  a  flying  fish  fluttered  upward  now  and 
then  from  the  waters  and  left  a  ripple  and  a  sparkle  in 
its  wake.  And  still  he  talked  on. 

The  centre  of  all  his  memories  and  imaginings  was 
the  eternal  womanly.  He  told  me  of  his  mother,  his  sis- 
ter, and  his  old  home  in  Yorkshire.  He  told  me  about  his 
boyhood  sweethearts,  of  the  first  time  he  had  kissed  a 
girl,  and  how  surprisingly  sweet  it  had  seemed.  He  told 
me,  in  adoring  ternis,  of  his  wife  in  the  days  of  their 
courtship;  of  the  night  she  promised  to  marry  him — & 
damp,  moonless  night,  among  the  rainy  roses  of  the  old 
garden  where  neither  of  them  should  have  been,  for  they 
were  getting  their  feet  very  wet.  She  had  a  cold  in  conse- 
quence and  would  not  see  him  for  two  days,  because  she 
said  no  woman  could  be  charming  when  she  had  a  cold. 
He  told  me  about  his  marriage,  and  how  he  felt  when 
his  first  baby  was  born.  And  always,  like  a  melancholy 
refrain,  he  placed  all  experiences  in  time  and  space  with 
the  words,  "When  she  was  with  me."  He  told  me  how  he 
dreamed  of  his  wife — and  often  of  strange  kiddies  and 
sweet  girls  whom  he  had  never  seen.  But  always  they 
were  blond-haired  and  fresh-faced  and  rosy,  not  like 
people  in  India.  He  felt  maddened  by  the  eternal  sight 
of  dark  faces.  Sometimes  he  would  dream  of  his  wife 
turning  black  before  his  very  eyes,  and  awake  in  a 
sweat  of  horror. 

"And  when  I  saw  you  to-day,"  he  continued.     "You 


CARUSO  281 

don't  know  how  it  all  came  back  to  ine — my  witV,  you 
know,  and  my  youth.  I  thought,  'God !  but  she  looks 
like  England !' ' 

There  was  something  visionary  and  impersonal  in  his 
manner,  and  his  words  seemed  to  me  like  no  private 
compliment.  When  I  said  good-night,  he  seemed 
scarcely  to  notice  my  going.  But  I  was  realizing,  to  my 
dismay,  that  it  was  midnight.  I  had  not  intended  to 
walk  so  late.  Every  one  had  disappeared  from  the 
smoking-room  and  several  pajamaed  individuals  were 
snoring  on  their  blankets  in  the  corners  of  the  decks, 
after  the  custom  on  tropical  ships. 

So  I  fled  down  to  my  cabin,  doing  my  best  not  to  dis- 
turb any  one's  dreams.  When  I  tried  to  lock  my  cabin 
door,  the  key  would  not  turn  in  the  lock.  Here  was  a 
predicament.  No  one  seemed  to  be  abroad.  There  was 
not  a  cabin-boy  in  sight.  I  rang  and  rang,  and  got  no 
response.  Finally  I  thought  cheerfully,  "Well,  I  suppose 
I  won't  be  kidnapped  before  morning,"  and  stowed  my- 
self away  on  the  upper  bunk,  without  further  negotia- 
tions with  the  recalcitrant  key. 

Suddenly  I  was  awakened  from  a  dream  in  which  I 
seemed  to  be  punching  a  man's  face, — for  no  apparent 
reason, — to  find  some  one  standing  in  the  middle  of  my 
cabin-floor.  Some  dim  radiance  from  a  light  in  the  hall 
revealed  Caruso.  I  did  not  know  exactly  how  to  open  a 
social  conversation  with  a  man  who  had  mysteriously 
appeared  in  my  cabin  at  midnight.  But  I  managed  to 
gasp  out  an  invitation  to  him  to  walk  out.  He  paid  no 
attention,  and,  I  must  confess,  just  as  little  apparent 
attention  to  me.  There  was  something  strange  and 
fumbling  and  uncertain  in  his  manner.  I  did  not  want 
to  raise  an  alarm  before  I  had  to,  though  that  would 
have  been  easy  enough,  for  there  were  people  in  the 


282  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

cabins  all  around  me.  The  publicity  would  have  been 
unpleasant.  So  I  repeated  my  invitation  to  him  to  de- 
part. He  turned  uncertainly  toward  the  door,  like  a 
man  acting  under  the  command  of  a  hypnotist.  Just  as 
he  opened  the  door,  he  seemed  suddenly  to  come  to. 

"My  God,"  he  said,  "  will  you  ever  forgive  me?" 

"There  will  be  no  forgiveness,"  I  answered  sharply, 
"till  you  are  on  the  other  side  of  that  door." 

He  slipped  out  without  another  word. 

Next  morning  Caruso  did  not  come  to  breakfast.  I 
encountered  him  accidentally  in  the  writing-room,  where 
he  was  lying  on  the  couch,  pale  and  haggard.  He  imme- 
diately poured  forth  a  somewhat  incoherent  explanation 
and  apology. 

"You  know  how  it  is,"  he  said,  "your  cabin  is  exactly 
parallel  to  mine,  but  on  the  other  side  of  the  ship.  And 
when  I  went  down  from  the  decks,  I  had  got  turned 
around,  and  was  going  up  the  wrong  corridor.  I 
touched  your  door,  thinking  it  was  my  own,  and  it  gave 
under  my  hand  and  then — and  then,  I  saw  you.  You 
never  will  understand  the  rest.  It  was  only  a  look  I 
wanted — I  swear  it ;  there  was  nothing  in  my  mind  that 
you  could  resent.  But  oh !  it  was  a  sight  I  was  starved 
for — you,  you  good,  pure  girl  asleep,  and  all  your  little 
womanly  things  about  the  place.  You  don't  understand. 
It  was  only  a  look.  I  thought  you  would  never  know." 

"Nevertheless,"  I  answered,  "it  was  an  unwarranted 
intrusion." 

He  continued  to  explain  and  plead  for  pardon.  At 
last  I  said :  "It  is  not  that  I  do  not  'forgive5  you.  It  is 
only  that  nothing  can  immediately  restore  the  sense  of 
ease  and  pleasure  that  I  had  in  your  company  yesterday. 
That's  the  sort  of  consequence  one  can  only  live  down." 

"I'll  do  it.    By  heaven,  I'll  do  it,"  he  said,  and  fell  at 


CAKUSO  28:5 

once  into  cheerful  impersonal  talk,  as  if  he  were  deter- 
mined to  show  me  he  was  not  an  hysterical  fool  after  all. 
Diverted  from  his  own  obsession,  his  speech  was  enter- 
taining and  well  informed.  But,  over-estimating  his  re- 
newed strength  of  mind,  he  asked  me,  cheerfully  enough, 
whether  I  was  not  betrothed. 

"Yes,"  I  answered. 

He  said  nothing.  In  the  momentary  embarrassment 
that  came  with  his  sudden  silence,  I  pleaded  some  small 
excuse  and  rose  to  go.  He  clutched  my  dress.  "Remem- 
ber me  when  you  go  to  your  own  great  happiness,"  he 
said,  and  turned  suddenly  away.  His  shoulders  were 
shaking  with  sobs,  and  he  was  weeping,  with  a  great 
gush  of  tears,  as  a  woman  weeps. 

Thereafter  our  relations  were  confined  to  the  most  dis- 
tant formalities  of  ship-board;  and  he  did  not  come 
within  conversing  distance  of  me  at  any  time.  On  the 
dock  at  Calcutta,  he  approached  me  and,  offering  his 
hand,  said  good-bye  like  the  merest  acquaintance.  Nor 

did  he  ever  cross  my  path  again. 

******* 

Two  days  afterward  we  sailed  up  the  muddy  stream  of 
the  Hoogly  River  to  Calcutta,  in  the  late  afternoon,  and 
from  the  events  of  the  next  twenty-four  hours  I  date 
another  stage  in  my  story. 


BOOK  FIVE 


CHAPTEE  XXXVII 

PEACE 

CALCUTTA  is  the  Book  of  Snobs  writ  large.  Only  an 
Anglo-Saxon  people  could  make  such  an  ugly  city.  Only 
in  the  tropics  will  a  city  so  slack  and  so  corrupt  be 
found.  And  yet  there  is  a  certain  pathos  about  it,  the 
pathos  of  men  preserving  face  under  discouraging  condi- 
tions. From  the  sunburned  grass  which  tries  so  inef- 
fectually to  imitate  the  turfy  lawns  of  England  to  the 
somewhat  tawdry  social  adventure  of  Peliti's,  there  is 
everywhere  the  poor  bravery  of  an  attempt  to  make  Lon- 
don and  London  society  in  the  wilderness. 

The  city  stretches  for  miles,  a  jungle  of  dingy  build- 
ings on  a  dingy  plain.  The  streets  are  thronged  with  a 
hopeless  race  of  black  men  and  a  damaged  race  of  white 
men.  The  black  men  have  a  draped  and  turbaned  dig- 
nity, and  what  looks  like  the  sorrow  of  ten  thousand 
years  in  their  eyes.  They  do  not  blossom  in  the  gaiety  of 
purple  and  fine  linen  or  wear  festive  petticoats  like  the 
merry  Burmese.  They  are  a  drab  race  and  wear  a  drab 
costume. 

Strange  this  impression  of  sordid  tragedy  which  Cal- 
cutta made  upon  me  on  my  landing  that  afternoon  in 
November,  and  from  which  I  never  wholly  recovered,  for 
I  entered  at  a  moment  when  all  the  world  was  ready  to 
flash  forth  into  a  great  rejoicing.  It  being  too  late  to 
make  connections  with  any  one  that  day,  I  went  lone- 
somely  and  forlornly  to  a  hotel  to  wait  till  morning. 
Even  before  I  had  disentangled  myself  from  all  the  small 

287 


288  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

nuisances  of  landing,  the  vast  and  terrible  night  of 
India  fell  like  a  pall  over  the  city.  An  acrid  smoke 
veiled  the  stars  and  mingled  with  feverish  mists.  It  was 
the  smoke  of  burning  human  flesh,  for  the  scourge  of 
influenza  was  abroad  in  the  land,  and  the  fires  of  the 
native  crematories  reddened  the  night.  In  every  door- 
way and  alley  the  leprosied  outcast  hordes,  who  beg  by 
day  and  dwell  nowhere,  lay  wrapped  in  their  white  blan- 
kets and  slept  like  the  sheeted  dead. 

As  the  hours  drew  toward  midnight  gharries  and  taxi- 
cabs  went  by,  full  of  flushed  and  giggling  English  women 
and  incoherent  men  returning  from  late  dinners.  The 
whole  city  was  on  a  spree.  Everywhere  there  was  a 
stir  and  hope.  Men  boasted  vaguely  over  their  cups. 
The  war  was  ending.  There  seemed  to  be  no  authentic 
information  to  that  effect.  Yet  everywhere  there  was 
the  intuition. 

I  dared  not  hope.  There  seemed  something  almost 
sinister  in  the  universal  drunkenness  of  that  night,  as  if 
it  were  the  prelude  to  some  disaster.  So  I  went  to  sleep, 
feeling  alone  and  strange  in  this  new  land,  and  very  far 
from  all  that  I  loved.  Suddenly  a  vague  horror  en- 
wrapped me  like  a  nightmare.  I  awoke,  startled,  terri- 
fied. The  stone  walls  of  the  hotel  were  vibrating  to  a 
wild  outcry  of  music,  squeaking,  whining,  throbbing, 
rejoicing.  There  were  drums  and  instruments  of  tor- 
turing melody.  Without,  in  the  darkness  I  heard  cheers, 
violent  drunken  cheers  nearby,  faint  cheers  far  off.  All 
over  the  city  the  lights  flared.  And  still  that  barbarous 
crash  of  European  and  Indian  instruments  in  the  hands 
of  some  annunciatory  procession  of  inebriate  English- 
men and  ragamuffin  natives  marching. 

Bizarre  as  was  that  outcry  upon  the  feverish,  smoke- 
laden  night,  I  understood.  This,  then,  was  peace.  So 


PEACE  281) 

strangely,  in  a  form  so  crude  and  melancholy,  did  the 
great  annunciation  come  to  me,  alone,  on  that  first  night 
in  a  far-off  land.  Yet  so  wholly  had  my  own  private  life 
been  merged  with  that  of  multitudes  of  people  for 
months,  since  I  had  left  Japan,  that  my  first  thought  was 
not  of  the  liberty  that  this  gave  to  my  own  little  love.  I 
thought  how  terrible  must  be  this  drunken  mirth  in  the 
ears  of  those  to  whom  peace  would  never  bring  back 
their  dead. 

Afterwards  I  lay  awake  till  morning,  through  all  the 
shrieking  night,  till  the  dawn  came  up  over  a  dusty  palm 
tree — a  glad  and  quiet  sense  of  release  growing  upon 
me.  There  was  no  shadow  now  behind  that  wedding  day 
in  January,  and  no  more  puzzle  and  uncertainty.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  I  could  scarcely  wait  for  the  sailing 
of  the  ship  that  was  to  take  me  back  over  the  paths  I 
had  just  traversed. 

Next  morning  Calcutta  looked  like  a  man  who  has 
suddenly  come  into  a  fortune  and  does  not  know  what 
to  do  with  it.  The  Englishman,  so  game  in  disaster,  is 
helpless  in  felicity,  abashed,  awkward,  inarticulate. 
The  Indians  felt  shy,  like  poor  relations  in  the  house  of 
rejoicing.  Only  a  few  wealthy  and  princely  Hindus  rose 
to  the  occasion  with  an  aplomb  of  which  the  Briton  is 
not  master,  and  distributed  congratulatory  gifts. 

Almost  immediately  after  my  ten  o'clock  breakfast, 
while  I  was  wondering  how  to  attack  this  great  land,  the 
cards  of  some  callers  came  to  me.  Callers  for  me !  How 
could  any  one  know  that  I  was  in  India !  When  I  went 
down,  I  found  a  nice  boy  in  white  duck  and  the  prettiest 
lady  in  India,  whom  I  must  describe  in  terms  of  later 
knowledge  because  they  have  since  become  so  dear  to 
me  that  I  can  scarcely  remember  how  it  seemed  to 
meet  them  as  strangers.  They  were  friends  of  Syd- 


290  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

ney's,  and,  though  no  word  from  him  had  come  to  me 
since  my  cable  to  him  from  the  Philippines,  they  had 
heard  from  him  of  my  coming  and  had  been  sent  to  take 
charge  of  my  destinies  in  his  stead.  Herbert  and 
Beatrice  I  will  call  them,  for  want  of  better  names. 
Herbert  was  merely  a  nice  boy  who  had  gone  to  Yale  and 
had  not  yet  recovered  from  it.  Nor  had  he  recovered 
from  amazement  at  finding  himself  really  the  husband  of 
Beatrice.  This  was  only  natural,  for  Beatrice  was  not 
the  sort  of  wife  that  a  man  acquires  every  day. 

Almost  every  land  had  gone  into  the  making  of  her, 
and  a  complex  and  cosmopolitan  bit  of  witchery  was  the 
result.  She  had  the  beauty  that  one  sees  in  old  Italian 
paintings,  not  indeed  in  the  sweetness  of  the  placid  and 
substantial  Madonnas  of  Raphael,  but  in  those  naughty 
boy  angels  of  Correggio  who  skate  through  Heaven  on 
clouds  and  meditate  mischief  under  the  very  eyes  of  the 
Eternal  Father.  Her  skin  had  the  smoothness  and 
lustre  of  a  white  rose  and  her  eyes  were  of  an  almost 
flowerlike  blueness.  There  was  in  them,  behind  a  glint 
of  sheer  fun,  a  shadow  of  sadness,  pathetic  and  haunting. 
Some  admirer  had  once  written  a  poem  about  her  in 
which  he  spoke  of  her  as  one 

Whose  soul  is  ages,  ages  old, 
Behind  those  dreamy  eyes. 

Her  hair  was  black  and  massy — without  gloss  or  any 
brightness — and  seemed  to  drink  in  the  light  like  black 
velvet.  It  surrounded  her  chiselled,  wilful,  blossom- 
tinted  face  with  a  kind  of  halo  of  darkness. 

People  usually  took  her  for  an  exotic  American  type. 
But  she  was  by  birth  Italian,  of  proud  and  ancient 
lineage.  She  had  nothing  in  common  with  the  swarthy 


PEACE  291 

Madonnas  of  our  little  Jtalies.  She  was  one  of  those  in 
whom  the  old  Roman  blood  had  been  toudied  to  fervour 
and  to  brightness  by  some  dash  of  the  Goth.  The  daugh- 
ter of  a  noted  archaeologist,  she  had  first  opened  her  blue 
eyes  on  the  deserts  of  Egypt,  where  her  father  was  un- 
earthing scarabs  and  forgotten  lore,  and  had  acquired 
her  first  knowledge  of  life  from  a  bag  swung  from  the 
back  of  a  camel.  Most  of  her  childhood  she  had  spent 
between  acquiring  torn-boy  tricks  and  an  instinct  of  good 
sportsmanship  in  vacations  in  England,  and  being  turned 
out  a  finished  little  French  maid  in  Paris.  She  could  not 
tell  whether  Italian,  French,  or  English  was  really  her 
native  tongue,  for  she  had  spoken  all  three  since  baby- 
hood, in  accents  of  pure  and  lingering  sweetness. 

At  seventeen  she  had  come  to  live  with  a  rich  aunt  in 
New  Haven  and  had  promptly  become  an  imitation  of  an 
American  girl  and  a  college  belle.  She  had  chosen  Her- 
bert from  a  cosmopolitan  collection  of  lovers  because  he 
had  had  the  nerve  to  rid  her  of  an  unwelcome  Russian 
count  by  announcing  himself  as  her  fiance".  She  had 
never  considered  him  in  exactly  that  light,  but  she  re- 
warded his  brass  by  living  up  to  the  assumption.  A 
series  of  complications  ensued.  Her  European  relatives, 
who  had  counted  on  her  beauty,  accomplishments,  and 
breeding  to  win  her  a  prince  or  at  least  a  plutocrat,  felt 
that  she  had  married  beneath  her.  His  good  old  parents, 
in  a  Massachusetts  village,  could  only  feel  that  he  had 
been  taken  in  by  "that  foreign  woman"  who  was  no 
doubt  papistical  or  otherwise  heathen.  They  prayed  for 
him  at  family  devotions,  inquired  into  the  status  of  his 
church  attendance  after  marriage,  and  hoped  that  she 
did  not  smoke  cigarettes. 

They  had  escaped  from  these  social  problems  by  elop- 
ing to  India,  where  Herbert  acquired  all  the  privileges 


292  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

of  selling  typewriters  on  the  borders  of  civilization. 
Even  in  India  the  brilliant  and  high-bred  girl  sometimes' 
found  herself  face  to  face  with  the  vulgar  Anglo-Saxon 
prejudice  against  the  foreigner.  She  liked  to  announce 
with  an  air  of  confessing  a  shady  past:  "Do  you  know 
what  I  am?  I  am  a  dago." 

Once  an  Englishwoman,  learning  that  she  was  Italian 
and  not  American,  as  was  usually  supposed,  bustled  up 
to  her  with  kindliness  and  compromise  beaming  in  her 
honest  plebeian  face : 

"You  know,"  she  said,  "I  don't  really  mind  foreign- 
ers." 

"I  am  sorry,"  said  Beatrice,  "but  I  do." 

Under  their  direction  my  plans  took  shape  at  once. 
Beatrice  it  seems  had  been  wishing  for  a  companion  in 
a  little  trip  among  the  cities  of  the  North.  Would  I  not 
come  with  her?  Herbert  supported  her  suggestion  with 
an  offer  of  his  trusty  servant  Abdul  as  escort,  a  schedule 
of  railroad  trains  and  hostelries,  and  introductions  to 
every  one,  from  missionaries  to  rajahs.  So,  in  a  flash,  it 
was  all  decided,  and  we  would  start  day  after  to-morrow. 

But  as  they  arose  to  go,  Herbert  said,  "Have  you 
made  all  arrangements  for  your  return  sailing?  Sydney 
will  never  forgive  us  if  we  don't  pack  you  off  in  time." 

"Yes,"  I  said,  mentioning  the  date  of  departure  late  in 
December. 

He  looked  a  little  troubled.  "You  know  this  armistice 
is  likely  to  change  all  sailing  arrangements." 

"But  not  to  Japan." 

"That's  just  what  I  am  afraid  of.  They're  likely  to 
turn  all  the  boats  going  that  way  around,  and  send  them 
through  the  Suez  Canal.  And  they  are  still  more  likely 
to  say  that  Americans  who  are  mere  private  citizens  can- 
not get  accomodations  on  any  ship  till  the  official  British 


PEACE 


2JK! 


who  have  been  stranded  here  for  years  have  an  oppor- 
tunity to  get  home.  You  might  as  well  begin  to  resign 
yourself  to  staying  in  India  a  year." 

For  a  moment  I  touched  the  bottom-most  depths  of 
despair.  Then  my  hopes  shot  up  again  like  an  empty 
bucket. 

"Nevertheless,"  I  said,  "I  won't  postpone  my  wedding 
day." 

"I  hope  not,"  he  answered.  "And  if  you  will  give  me 
the  permission  and  all  necessary  data,  I'll  do  my  best 
to  make  arrangements  to  get  you  out  of  India,  while  you 
and  Beatrice  are  breaking  hearts  in  northern  India." 

So  it  was  settled,  and  Beatrice,  seeing  how  troubled  I 
still  was,  applied  such  magic  of  hope  and  such  sweetness 
of  confirmatory  description  to  my  accounts  of  Sydney, 
that  the  pure  contentment  that  the  news  of  the  armistice 
had  brought  into  the  dawning  of  that  day  returned  with 
double  gladness. 


CHAPTEK  XXXVIII 

LADIES  OF  THE  ZENANA 

THAT  afternoon,  feeling  venturesome  and  elated  after 
this  fortunate  morning,  I  went  to  call  on  a  missionary, 
for  missionaries  are  always  the  door  to  knowledge  of 
that  obscure,  undifferentiated,  inglorious  life  that  un- 
derlies all  Oriental  splendour  like  dirt  beneath  one's  feet. 
I  said  that  I  wished  to  know  of  the  life  of  Indian  women, 
and  almost  immediately  an  excursion  with  a  zenana  mis- 
sionary was  arranged.  It  was  not  to  be  an  evangelical 
tour,  but  just  a  social  call. 

The  zenana  is  the  woman's  quarter  of  the  Hindu 
household,  where  the  wives  live  "behind  the  veil,"  invis- 
ible to  all  except  the  husband.  Though  the  Hindu  is,  in 
most  cases,  monagamous,  whatever  extra  privileges  of 
concubinage  he  may  permit  himself,  the  household  is  of 
the  same  patriarchal  type  that  prevails  in  China.  The 
wives  of  the  sons,  and  sometimes  of  the  sons'  sons,  are 
brought,  as  little  girls,  to  live  in  the  house  of  the  parents, 
under  the  rule  of  the  mother-in-law.  But  what  the  Chi- 
nese obtains  by  foot-binding  in  the  limitation  of  free  mo- 
tion among  his  women  folk,  the  Hindu  obtains  by  the 
"purdah"  or  veil.  The  word  is  not  merely  the  term  for 
the  drapery  which  hides  the  woman's  face  from  every 
man  but  her  lord,  even  from  her  father-in-law,  and  her 
brothers.  It  is  a  symbol  of  a  most  rigorous  system  of 
seclusion  which  keeps  the  woman  practically  gaoled 
within  her  own  quarters.  Like  the  Turkish  harem,  the 
zenana  is  the  centre  of  mystery  to  the  white  man,  and 
even  to  the  white  woman  in  the  Orient,  and  few  are  those 

294 


LADIES  OF  THE  ZENANA  295 

who  win  the  confidence  of  the  proprietors  of  its  con- 
cealed treasures  sufficiently  to  make  social  intercourse 
possible. 

The  particular  zenana  from  which  this  invitation  ema- 
nated was  a  highly  "advanced"  place.  Not  that  the 
veiled  beings  who  dwelt  there  had  any  education  or  had 
ever  looked  beyond  the  iron  bars  of  their  own  balconies ! 
They  had  not.  Only  once,  for  a  few  months  of  intoxi- 
cating freedom,  one  of  them  had  gone  to  a  mission 
school.  From  behind  her  purdah,  seated  in  a  balcony 
by  herself  where  she  would  not  be  contaminated,  she 
had  heard  the  manlike  wisdom  and  witnessed  the  man- 
like freedom  of  the  genuinely  Christian  girls.  Forever 
afterward  this  experience  had  served  as  a  topic  of  con- 
versation among  her  scandalized  sisters-in-law.  The 
mission  named  her  Minerva  because  she  was  the  source 
of  all  wisdom  in  the  zenanas. 

The  peculiarity  of  the  zenana  which  we  were  invited 
to  visit  was  that  the  mother,  being  a  lady  of  strong  will, 
and  having  no  sons  and  considerable  money,  had  been 
able  to  get  her  sons-in-law  to  come  to  her  house  instead 
of  sending  her  daughters  to  theirs.  Hence  the  daugh- 
ters, being  under  their  own  mother's  roof,  contrived  to 
enjoy  a  special  measure  of  freedom  and  happiness.  The 
peculiar  advantages  of  this  system  became  obvious  when 
the  husband  of  one  of  the  daughters  died  without  leav- 
ing children.  According  to  Hindu  law  her  personal  life 
had  died  with  her  husband.  She  would  remain  simply 
as  a  drudge  in  the  house  of  her  mother-in-law — joyless, 
despised.  But  among  her  own  sisters,  under  the  juris- 
diction of  her  mother,  the  lot  of  the  young  widow  was 
softened  by  affection. 

Like  other  dwelling-places  of  the  rich  in  India,  the 
mansion  we  were  to  visit  concealed  its  magnificence 


296  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

from  the  public  as  carefully  as  an  Oriental  hides  the 
beauty  of  his  wife.  After  roaming  among  some  ill-smell- 
ing mud-hovels,  we  suddenly  issued  into  a  cool  and  bril- 
liant courtyard.  It  was  brightly  paved  with  mosaics  and 
surrounded  by  gay  pillars  and  balconies.  In  the  middle 
of  the  court  a  fountain  was  playing. 

A  servant  dumbly  indicated  that  we  were  to  ascend 
to  the  upper  regions.  Climbing  some  narrow,  uncom- 
fortable stone  steps,  we  came  out  into  stone  courts  above. 
Minerva  ran  to  greet  us,  vivaciously  throwing  back  her 
veil  from  her  head  and  bare  shoulders  and  touching  our 
hands  to  show  that  she  had  no  Brahminical  fear  of 
contamination.  The  widow  followed.  She  placidly 
smiled  a  greeting,  but  did  not  come  near  enough  to  risk 
an  accidental  contact.  Her  subdued  mien  and  ash-col- 
oured garments  indicated  her  lot  in  the  household. 

The  others  followed  more  shyly.  With  a  soft  fall  of 
bare  feet  and  tinkle  of  anklets,  with  a  fluttering  of  gor- 
geous chiffonlike  materials  of  rose  and  mauve  and  green, 
they  stole  in  one  by  one  and  bashfully  coquetted  with  us 
around  the  edge  of  their  saris.  Then  there  came  a  thud 
and  scraping  on  the  floor,  and  the  babies  appeared 
There  were  about  a  million  of  them — odd,  dusky,  un- 
healthy little  creatures  clothed  only  in  necklaces,  brace- 
lets, and  anklets,  with  great  painted  eyes. 

Minerva  undertook  the  guidance  of  the  conversation. 
Was  it  true  that  there  was  peace?  she  demanded.  We 
asked  her  how  she  had  heard  about  it.  She  said  there 
was  a  whisper  about  it  among  the  men.  She  had  ex- 
tracted something  about  it  from  her  husband.  The  ze- 
nana exists  on  information  extracted  from  husbands. 
Every  wife  gets  what  she  can  out  of  her  own  spouse,  and, 
when  their  lords  are  out  of  sight,  they  all  gather  to- 
gether and  pool  their  data  and  make  plans  for  concerted 


1  § 

H3 


fa   sra 


r        C    ca 


T:  — 
c  U 


o  c 
TT  -g 
•2  g 


LADIES  OF  THE  ZENANA  297 

action.  The  result  is  sometimes  a  degree  of  feminine 
influence  in  masculine  lives  which  would  horrify  the 
husbands  of  our  feminist  lands.  I  have  heard  the  British 
adviser  to  one  of  the  most  powerful  of  the  Indian  princes 
say  that  the  zenana  is  the  curse  of  Indian  politics.  Lack 
of  knowledge  of  the  problems  of  men  in  the  world  makes 
for  no  diminution  in  the  feminine  wish  to  rule  the  desti- 
nies of  husband  and  son.  In  the  case  of  our  hostesses, 
their  knowledge  of  the  war,  though  gory  and  romantic, 
proved  to  be  amazingly  full.  Yet  I  thought  that  surely 
they  must  be  using  terms  parrotlike,  for  what  images 
could  much  that  they  talked  of  convey  to  women  who 
had  never  been  outside  their  own  courts? 

Suddenly  a  hush  fell  over  the  group.  Each  girl  com- 
posed her  sari  and  rescued  her  children  from  mischief. 
This  meant  that  the  mother-in-law,  whom  the  missionary 
called  the  "Easy  Boss,"  was  coming.  The  Easy  Boss 
was  a  mighty  old  woman  with  great  manlike  limbs 
and  a  masculine  face.  Unlike  the  younger  women  she 
did  not  crouch  on  the  floor.  She  sat  on  a  stool,  with 
her  legs  crossed  and  the  air  of  a  councillor  of  state.  She 
spoke  about  the  war  in  a  tone  of  firmness  and  authority. 
Yes,  she  said,  it  was  well  that  the  war  was  ended.  Now 
the  prices  would  be  better  and  one  need  not  live  in  daily 
fear  of  robbery. 

Was  she  afraid  lest  the  war  should  rob  her?  we  asked. 

She  answered:  A  long  war  meant  heavy  taxes.  The 
longer  the  war,  the  heavier  the  tax.  In  the  end  the 
British  would  have  been  obliged  to  come  and  take  away 
all  their  wealth.  But  she  had  prepared  for  that;  they 
couldn't  get  hers. 

After  having  done  the  honours  for  us,  she  left  us  in 
order  to  hold  the  ceremony  of  family  worship.  We  per- 
suaded her  to  let  us  see  her  gods.  They  were  a  collection 


298  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

of  misshapen,  gaudily  painted  images  in  an  upper  room. 
She  spoke  of  religion  with  a  certain  materialism  and  tol- 
erance. Like  the  family  and  the  family  wealth,  religion 
was  an  institution  to  be  supported.  She  talked  like  some 
prosperous  old  deacon  and  was  as  perfect  a  bourgeois 
type  as  I  have  ever  seen. 

The  minute  the  Easy  Boss  was  safely  occupied  with 
the  gods,  a  buzz  of  frivolous  chatter  rose  between  the 
zenana  and  us.  It  was  regular  woman's  talk,  all  about 
clothes,  babies,  and  household  matters.  They  showed  us 
their  collections  of  gowns  or  saris,  a  marvellous  array  of 
delicate  silk  and  gold  embroidery,  and  we  explained  how 
our  clothes  were  put  together.  Their  jewelry  they 
could  not  show  us.  I  persisted.  Why  couldn't  we  see 
their  jewelry?  Had  not  India  been  the  land  of  gems 
from  the  beginning  of  time?  I  wanted  to  see  the  jew- 
elled ladies  behind  the  veil,  in  full  regalia.  At  last  Mi- 
nerva confessed :  Mother  had  sold  their  jewels.  She  said 
if  the  war  continued  much  longer,  the  British  might 
take  them  for  taxes.  So  she  had  sold  all  the  gems  and 
other  valuables,  and  with  the  money  she  had  bought 
land.  "No  one,"  she  had  said  triumphantly,  "could 
carry  away  the  land!"  This,  then,  was  her  secret,  her 
method  of  outwitting  the  government ! 

To  me  the  life  of  these  women  seemed  pathetic.  Mar- 
ried at  twelve,  denied  all  normal  work  and  exercise,  liv- 
ing in  a  continual  state  of  negligee,  cut  off  from  the  out- 
side world — how  could  they  be  well  or  happy?  They  cer- 
tainly did  not  look  well.  Most  of  them  were  sallow  and 
anemic ;  some — not  the  vivacious  daughters  of  the  house, 
but  acquired  sisters-in-law  of  other  branches  of  the  fam- 
ily— were  fat  and  sensual.  Grace,  gentleness,  and  na- 
ivete' they  all  had,  and  a  soft  and  pretty  desire  to  please. 
They  were  like  sleek  pets,  as  lovable  and,  except  for  the 


LADIES  OF  THE  ZENANA  291) 

function  of  motherhood,  as  important  in  life  as  kittens. 

I  soon  discovered  that  my  pity  for  them  was  nothing 
in  comparison  with  their  pity  for  me.  AVhat  a  great, 
ugly,  faded  thing  I  was,  to  be  sure!  My  hair  was  so 
rough  and  my  clothes  so  mal  apropos.,  and  I  wore  a 
strange  structure  on  my  head  and  covered  my  feet  with 
a  substance  so  ugly  and  so  thick  it  was  a  wonder  I  could 
walk. 

I  even  confessed  that  I  had  no  husband.  Then  their 
pity  knew  no  bounds.  What  sort  of  monster  was  I  that 
my  parents  had  never  been  able  to  find  me  a  husband! 
Didn't  we  have  husbands  in  the  country  that  I  came 
from ! 

Finally  my  companion,  lifting  my  ringed  finger,  said 
playfully  that  I  should  soon  have  a  husband.  The  news 
was  communicated  from  one  to  the  other.  They  broke 
into  little  congratulatory  sounds  and  flutterings,  and 
gathered  around  me  like  pretty  birds,  with  brightened 
eyes  and  self-conscious  blushes,  to  know  all  about  it. 
How  did  we  manage  such  things  in  our  country?  Had 
I  really  seen  him  already?  What!  I  knew  him  very 
well.  How  strange!  It  did  not  seem  to  them  quite 
proper.  And  the  ring !  Only  men  wore  rings,  according 
to  their  notion.  They  wanted  to  go  farther.  They  were 
trying  to  imagine  the  intimacies  of  married  life  as  ob- 
taining between  creatures  who  struck  them  as  being 
monstrous  and  unnatural  in  all  their  ways.  But  bash- 
fulness  checked  their  inquiries.  Yet  between  us  there 
was  now  a  common  basis  of  humanity — that  mysterious 
current  of  womanly  kindness  which  has  its  source  in  the 
great  elemental  cares  and  triumphs  and  adventures  of 
womanhood.  And  when  I  left,  they  crowded  around  me 
and  wished  me  happiness  as  sincerely  and  kindly  as  if 
they  were  my  own  sisters. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

A  GUEST  OF  TAGORB  AT  SHANTINIKETAN 

THE  railroad  station  in  Calcutta  gives  little  sign  of  the 
pageantry  of  cities  that  lies  beyond — Benares,  Allaha- 
bad, Agra — names  sweet  and  strange  on  the  tongue, 
and  beautiful  with  the  decadent  beauty  of  the  East.  It 
was  strictly  on  faith  that  Beatrice  and  I  set  forth  to  spy 
out  their  secrets  on  that  sultry  November  morning,  with 
romance  in  our  hearts  and  good  honest  chicken  sand- 
wiches under  our  arms.  Beatrice,  I  believe,  still  hoped 
to  find  some  abode  of  "mysticism,"  and  read  all  the 
secrets  of  human  life  and  the  darkness  that  environs  it 
in  some  wizard's  crystal  or  the  blaze  of  the  desert  stars. 
During  six  months  in  Calcutta  she  had  not  yet  unlearned 
that  knowledge  of  India  which  one  acquires  in  San 
Francisco  and  Greenwich  Village.  I  was  more  sceptical, 
yet  not  without  a  sense  of  the  dramatic  in  our  expedi- 
tion. I  was  carrying  to  Sir  Rabindranath  Tagore  a  copy 
of  the  newspaper  containing  the  terms  of  the  armistice. 
It  was  interesting  to  bring  the  documentary  evidence 
of  one  of  the  supreme  crises  in  history  into  the  retreat 
of  poetry  in  the  desert. 

So  we  looked  around  on  that  railroad  station  with 
eyes  still  dazzled  with  the  incorrigible  romance  that 
youth  and  much  reading  bring  to  the  Orient.  And  faith, 
the  prospect  needed  such  spiritual  illumination!  The 
station  had  none  of  the  sweep  of  line  and  depth  of 
space  which  lend  majesty  to  great  American  ter- 

300 


A  GUEST  OF  TAGORE  301 

urinals.  It  was  dirty  and  frowsy  and  overgrown.  Tho 
trains  puffed  in  fussily  and  ambled  away  without  dig- 
nity. The  waiting  hordes,  with  all  their  worldly  goods 
tied  up  in  dirty  linen,  were  scarcely  more  picturesque 
than  Italian  immigrants  or  gipsies  on  the  march.  Here 
and  there  a  figure  stood  out  in  brilliant  relief.  An  old 
Kashmiri,  with  eyes  as  blue  as  the  lakes  of  Ireland,  had 
seated  himself  on  a  rug  and  spread  out  the  treasures  of 
his  mountain  vale  before  him — inlaid  turquoise,  coloured 
embroideries  that  had  the  radiance  and  sheen  of  stained 
glass,  and  woolen  shawls  which  were  like  snowflakes. 
Nearby  an  Afghan  in  baggy  trousers  and  spangled  dress 
was  sharpening  a  knife.  A  creature  all  masked  in  white 
like  a  Ku  Klux  rider  was  spirited  past.  This  was  a 
high-born  Moslem  lady.  She  would  be  seated  alone  in 
a  first-class  compartment,  and  would  travel  uncontam- 
inated  by  the  gaze  of  men. 

Meanwhile  Abdul  presided  over  our  baggage  and  sun- 
dry savouries  in  the  way  of  lunch  with  all  the  dignity  of 
a  sultan.  He  was  a  stately  creature  with  regular, 
haughty  features  and  great  dark  eyes  which  looked  out 
on  the  world  with  the  gaze  of  one  who  has  learned  all 
the  secrets  of  life,  and  has  found  it,  not  good  indeed,  but 
not  so  bad  as  it  might  be.  Around  his  head  were  wound 
folds  upon  folds  of  white  linen  in  a  turban  which  was  a 
marvel  of  architectural  ingenuity.  But  he  wore  a  natty 
tweed  suit,  pleated  and  belted,  which  once  was  Herbert's 
and  had  an  indefinable  air  of  New  Haven  about  it,  and 
his  feet  were  shod  with  yellow  Oxfords  which  were  also 
graduates  of  Yale.  To  Herbert,  his  young  sahib,  Abdul 
was  already  deeply  and  abjectly  devoted  with  the  devo- 
tion that  only  the  heart  of  an  Indian  servant  knows. 
Beatrice  and  me  he  merely  tolerated;  but  we  were  his 
sahib's  property  and  as  such  were  sacred  in  his  eyes. 


302  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Herbert  knew  that,  when  that  first-class  carriage  pulled 
out,  bearing  us  into  all  the  adventures  and  dangers  of 
the  great  land  that  is  India,  we  could  have  no  better 
guardian. 

From  nine  in  the  morning  to  three  in  the  afternoon 
that  little  train  rattled  away  with  us  into  depths  of  dust 
and  sunshine  and  scenic  emptiness.  Outside  of  the  win- 
dows there  was  nothing  to  see,  just  unending  reaches  of 
sun-burned  earth  that  melted  at  last  into  the  white  emp- 
tiness of  sunshine  on  the  horizon.  Now  and  then  we 
pulled  up  with  a  jerk  at  a  little  railway  station,  and 
dark  Bengalis  in  white  draperies  came  listlessly  out  and 
looked  at  us,  while  some  one  more  officially  clad  an- 
nounced through  the  window  that  we  could  here  obtain 
cha.  Cha  is  vile  black  tea  which  one  consumes  in  un- 
limited quantities  on  these  dusty  journeys  in  lieu  of 
water  together  with  stodgy  toast  and  buffalo  butter,— 
unless,  perchance,  one  adopts  the  really  orthodox  bev- 
erage and,  as  the  day  wears  on,  becomes  mildly  soused 
in  whiskey  and  soda. 

About  three  we  were  suddenly  tumbled  off  into  the 
heart  of  silence  and  an  infinity  of  shining  space.  The 
train  pulled  off,  leaving  for  a  moment  a  little  ripple  of 
sound  and  a  stain  of  smoke  in  that  great  peace  and 
brightness.  We  stood,  we  two,  alone  in  the  desert. 
Not  wholly  alone — we  discovered !  A  woman  in  a  faded 
red  sari  looked  dreamily  at  us  and  went  on  polishing 
a  brass  bowl  in  the  dust.  A  naked  brown  baby — all 
dirt  and  creases  and  dimples — suddenly  rolled  out 
from  nowhere  and  sat  blinking  at  us.  A  cow  appeared 
and  swished  her  tail.  Then  a  voice  broke  upon  this  mute 
survey. 

"You  are  guests  of  the  Poet,  I  believe,"  said  some  one 
in  English  accents,  and  we  looked  into  the  thin,  sun- 


A  GUEST  OF  TAGORE  303 

burned  face  and  kind  blue  eyes  of  an  Englishman  clad 
in  flowing  Indian  draperies  which  flapped  uneasily 
about  his  restless  Occidental  figure. 

"The  Poet  has  sent  me  to  greet  you.  I  am  Mr.  An- 
drews." "Ex-Anglican,  reformer  and  subject  of  a  flat- 
tering dedication  by  Tagore,"  my  memory  immediately 
supplied.  He  produced  a  rattling  box  set  on  four  wheels 
and  drawn  by  a  somnambulant  animal,  and  invited  us 
to  enter.  We  doubled  ourselves  up  like  jackknives  in- 
side. The  beast  slowly  set  itself  in  motion,  and  we 
started  down  a  dusty  road  bordered  with  the  only  vege- 
tation in  sight,  in  the  shape  of  dusty  trees,  the  shadow 
of  whose  foliage  was  outlined  like  lace  in  the  golden 
dust  of  the  highway.  Beyond,  the  infinity  of  land  lay 
naked  in  the  sunshine.  Only  a  little  stream,  without 
currents  or  waves,  shone  blue  between  sandy  banks,  and 
palms  were  mirrored  in  it.  To  my  eyes  it  was  indeed  a 
desert;  and  thinking,  for  a  moment,  in  terms  of  the  grass 
and  flowers  and  tumbling  brooks  and  blue  hills  of  my 
own  land,  I  saw  no  beauty  there.  But  I  soon  found  in 
it  the  pervading  and  interpreting  spirit  of  a  poet's  love. 
For  Mr.  Andrews  kept  stopping  every  few  minutes  to 
point  out  some  secret  attraction — the  changing  tawny 
light  upon  the  tawny  earth,  perhaps,  or  the  vista  of  dusty 
trees  outlined  in  shadow  on  the  road,  or,  best  of  all,  the 
poet's  favourite  view,  where  the  blue  water  of  the  oasis 
shone  for  a  moment,  between  spires  of  desert  grass.  And 
as  he  spoke,  Beatrice's  eyes  brightened  till  they  outshone 
the  very  sunshine. 

"It  is  Egypt  again,"  she  cried.  "Oh,  there  is  nothing 
so  beautiful  in  all  the  world !" 

Then  something  of  the  sober  and  subtle  loveliness  took 
possession  of  me  too,  and  I  began  to  feel  that  against  the 
pure  austerity  and  dignity  of  that  vast  blaze  of  earth 


304  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

and  light  there  is  something  vulgar  and  sensual  in  the 
common  prettiness  and  fertility  of  our  western  fields. 

We  came  at  last  to  a  group  of  thatched  adobe  bunga- 
lows set  among  scrubby  trees.  Here  we  abandoned  the 
ekka  and  the  somnainbulant  beast  and  struck  into  a 
stony  trail  across  the  fields.  This  led  to  a  bungalow 
quite  detached  from  the  rest,  perhaps  a  quarter  of  a  mile 
from  them,  which,  Mr.  Andrews  told  us,  we  were  to  have 
all  to  ourselves  during  our  stay.  We  found  it  a  primi- 
tive dwelling,  much  like  a  simple  summer  cottage  in  our 
own  country,  consisting  of  two  rooms.  One  was  fur- 
nished as  a  dining-room  with  table,  chairs,  and  side- 
board; the  other  was  furnished  with  two  beds  covered 
with  bright  red  blankets,  and  a  table  on  which  the 
thoughtfulness  of  our  host  had  laid  out  all  the  latest 
American  magazines — magazines  which  I  had  not  been 
able  to  see  since  I  left  Japan,  but  which  had  come 
through  to  him  by  mail. 

"If  you  will  make  yourselves  at  home  here,"  said  Mr. 
Andrews  kindly,  "I  will  see  that  some  tea  is  sent  to  you, 
and  afterwards  the  Poet  himself  will  come  to  pay  his  re- 
spects." 

And  he  left  us  to  our  own  society  and  the  joys  of  a 
great  splash  in  cold  water. 

It  was  with  a  delightful  sense  of  proprietorship  and 
homelikeness  that  we  took  possession  of  that  little  house 
set  out  there  alone  in  the  empty  sunshine  in  the  heart  of 
this  strange  land.  It  was  almost  like  the  first  moments 
of  camping  out,  and  vaguely  reminded  us  of  other  days 
and  other  experiences  in  our  home-land  now  so  far  away. 
All  the  travelling  I  have  ever  done  has  been  greatly 
sweetened  by  my  early  summers  in  some  little  shack  in 
the  woods.  For  life  reduced  to  its  elementals  is  much  the 
same  the  world  over,  and  the  peculiar  joys  of  cold  water 


A  GUEST  OF  TAGORE  305 

and  the  taste  of  bread  to  one  hungry  with  exercise  and 
fresh  air  know  no  country  or  civilization.  Again  and 
again,  in  the  days  of  house-boating  in  China,  on  the 
slopes  of  Fujiyama,  in  the  mountains  of  Spain,  I  have 
returned  to  the  barest  roof  over  my  head  or  perhaps  only 
the  empty  sky,  and  to  food  that  consisted  of  bread  or 
rice  and  fruit — have  returned  with  a  certain  intimacy  of 
pleasure,  a  kind  of  home-coming  to  physical  sensation 
which  is  always  the  same,  and  which  links  experience 
with  experience  the  world  around.  It  was  with  a  pleas- 
ure and  exhilaration  of  old  association  that  I  fell  into 
the  austere  and  frugal  ways  of  Shantiniketan  and  that 
little  adobe  shack. 

As  soon  as  we  had  investigated  the  cold  water  and  the 
magazines,  a  boy  came  scurrying  across  the  fields  with 
cha  and  bananas.  The  cha  had  somewhat  cooled  in  tran- 
sit, but  it  was  still  refreshing  as  fairy  wine  to  girls  tired 
yet  eager  to  find  all  things  romantic.  The  tea  was  fol- 
lowed by  Mr.  Andrews,  who  had  carried  off  the  news- 
paper to  the  Poet.  He  was  full  of  talk  about  the 
armistice. 

As  we  were  speaking,  Mr.  Andrews  looked  out  and 
said: 

"The  Poet  is  coming." 

We  looked  out  across  the  fields.  I  don't  know  whether 
it  was  the  late  sunlight,  now  growing  so  golden,  or  some 
fancy  of  my  own,  but  he  whom  we  saw  seemed  for  a 
moment  a  being  of  visionary  majesty  and  beauty.  Ta- 
gore  is  at  all  times  a  remarkable  figure,  but  those  who 
saw  him  in  America  saw  him  transplanted,  out  of  his 
element,  in  contrast  with  a  world  too  unlike  him  to  make 
his  peculiar  charm  and  distinction  seem  ought  but 
exotic  and  even  bizarre.  But  on  that  golden  afternoon, 
against  his  own  desert  background,  he  seemed  the  very 


306  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

incarnation  and  spirit  of  the  austere  and  spacious 
land.  Clad  in  blue-grey  robes, — not  the  usual  Bengali 
costume,  but  a  kind  of  modification  of  the  Japanese 
kimono  made  full  and  flowing, — backed  and  haloed  by 
the  sunshine,  his  tall,  graceful  figure  moved  toward  us 
like  that  of  a  saint.  So  Christ  must  sometimes  have  ap- 
peared to  his  disciples,  gathering  some  visionary  beauty 
from  accidents  of  light  and  space. 

Then  the  vision  fled,  and  a  tall  man,  with  peculiarly 
sweet  bright  brown  eyes,  was  shaking  hands  with  us 
with  American  ease,  and  inquiring  after  friends  he  knew 
in  the  United  States.  The  talk  fell  into  quite  ordinary 
channels.  Yes,  he  loved  America  best  of  all  Occidental 
lands,  though  every  one  there  was  in  a  hurry,  and  the 
sunshine  at  its  brightest  seemed  to  him  like  cold  grey 
mist,  yet  certainly  not  so  cold  or  so  grey  as  the  dreary 
sunshine  of  northern  Europe.  He  remembered  Nash- 
ville and  his  visits  in  the  South  with  peculiar  pleasure. 
Southerners  were  more  like  the  people  of  India,  more 
leisurely,  less  serious  and  hurried.  Next  to  some  places 
in  the  South  he  loved  best  our  college  towns.  He  had 
been  very  happy  in  Urbana,  Illinois.  But  our  great 
cities — and  he  dropped  the  discussion  of  these  monstrosi- 
ties with  a  slight  expressive  gesture. 

He  thanked  us  for  the  paper  about  the  armistice;  the 
news  would  not  have  come  through  to  him  so  soon  other- 
wise. But  he  was  unwilling  to  talk  politics.  As  one 
under  the  suspicion  of  the  British  government,  because 
of  his  devotion  to  the  liberties  of  India,  he  seemed  to 
think  silence  the  better  part  of  discretion.  Those  who 
have  known  Tagore  only  on  parade  in  America,  her- 
alded as  a  mystic  by  a  zealous  lecture  agent,  and  the 
prey  of  adoring  ladies,  can  hardly  appreciate  the  natural 
charm  of  the  man  in  his  own  surroundings,  nor  his  play- 


A  GUEST  OF  TAGORE  307 

fulness  and  grace.  He  has  been  wronged  by  the  empha- 
sis on  his  esoteric  wisdom,  and  continually  put  in  a 
false  position  among  us,  because  he  does  not  understand 
the  best  in  us,  nor  we  the  best  in  him.  So  foolish  people 
have  adored  him  falsely,  and  those  whom  he  should  meet 
have  been  alienated.  Could  he  have  come  as  a  simple 
man  among  us,  with  no  publishing  of  peculiarities  which 
are  rather  racial  than  personal,  could  he  have  talked  to 
frugal,  writing,  reading  folk — professors  and  scholars — 
in  quiet  places,  we  should  have  felt  a  life-giving  contact 
with  him  which  would  have  been,  perhaps,  the  most 
wholesome  of  all  possible  relations  between  the  East  and 
the  West. 

As  it  is,  people  in  America  who  should  be  above  such 
provincialism  have  declared  him  a  poseur  simply  be- 
cause his  ways  and  modes  of  speech  were  not  theirs, 
and  have  accounted  hypocrisy  in  him  what  would  be  hy- 
pocrisy in  themselves.  To  this  has  been  added  the  prop- 
aganda of  the  British  government  that  has  a  quarrel 
with  him  which  we  need  not  share,  and  which  is  no  more 
discreditable  to  him  than  the  career  of  George  Wash- 
ington is  to  America.  Tagore  is  not  a  saint  that  we 
should  worship  him,  nor  a  messenger  from  the  un- 
known to  reveal  to  us  the  secrets  beyond  death  and  our 
daily  life.  To  call  him  a  mystic  in  a  sense  wrongs  him, 
for  to  India  a  mystic  is  only  what  a  scholar  is  to  us,  a 
thoughtful  person  who  is  learning  of  life  as  much  as  he 
can.  But  he  is  a  poet,  with  the  poet's  freshness  of  heart 
and  magic  of  intuition,  and  whatever  deductions  we  may 
make  from  the  sum-total  of  what  is  called  his  philos- 
ophy, he  remains,  I  think,  the  greatest  poetic  personality 
of  our  age. 

Something  of  this  I  am  thinking  as  I  talked  to  him 
then,  and  the  impression  was  later  confirmed  in  his  re- 


308  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

cent  visit  to  America.  While  we  were  conversing,  the 
sun  had  come  near  to  the  horizon.  "Will  you  not  walk 
with  me?"  he  said.  "You  will  find  it  not  unpleasant 
now." 

We  stepped  out.  The  glare  and  the  dust  had  vanished, 
and  the  world  lay  purely  golden  in  the  vast  and  gentle 
radiance  of  the  descending  sun.  A  coolness  was  coming 
into  the  air  which  made  it  fresh  as  mountain  water, 
and  the  silence,  the  utter  soundlessness  of  the  desert 
space  environed  us  in  solemn  peace.  Our  talk  turned 
from  the  gossip  of  our  first  encounter  to  subjects  that 
seemed  more  in  spirit  with  the  hour. 

"When  I  was  a  little  girl,"  Beatrice  remarked,  "the 
horizon  always  fascinated  me.  I  thought,  if  I  could 
keep  on  walking  and  walking  until  I  reached  it,  I  should 
come  to  the  jumping-off  place  and  look  over  the  edge  of 
the  world  into  space." 

The  Poet  smiled.  "I  think  every  child  in  the  world 
has  had  that  thought,"  he  said.  "I  like  the  thoughts  of 
children — they  are  often  very  beautiful.  That  is  why  I 
love  to  have  them  with  me  here  at  Shantiniketan." 

And  he  went  on  to  tell  us  of  his  own  little  school  and 
of  the  history  of  this  retreat.  His  father,  a  notable 
teacher  and  mystic,  had  chosen  this  lonely  spot  as  a 
place  to  which  he  might  retire  for  rest  and  meditation 
when,  in  the  flurry  of  the  world  and  overmuch  struggle 
with  difficulties,  both  religious  and  practical,  he  felt  that 
he  was  losing  the  vision  that  sustained  him.  He  had 
planted  the  trees  and  had  built  here  a  house  and  a  little 
ehapel.  And  here  his  sons  had  learned  that  they  too 
might  come  to  cool  the  fever  of  their  souls  in  the  pres- 
ence of  silence  and  the  stars. 

Later,  when  the  Poet  began  to  think  of  education  and 
the  future  of  the  youth  of  his  own  ldnd,  tempted  as  they 


A  GUEST  OF  TAGOKE  300 

are  to  forget  the  purest  traditions  of  Indian  faith  and 
culture  in  devotion  to  the  science  and  machinery  of  the 
West,  it  had  occurred  to  him  that  he  might  revive  a  beau- 
tiful and  ancient  institution  of  his  country — the  forest 
school. 

This  ideal  the  Poet  had  tried  to  adapt  to  modern  In- 
dian life.  He  had  gathered  at  Shantiniketan  a  group  of 
boys  with  whom  he  shared  his  studies,  his  thoughts,  and 
the  making  of  his  poetry.  They  received  all  due  instruc- 
tion in  Western  learning  at  the  hands  of  competent 
teachers  like  Mr.  Andrews,  and  were  prepared  to  enter 
the  government  universities.  But  outside  of  this  neces- 
sary curriculum  they  tried  to  reproduce  the  ancient  sim- 
plicity and  naturalness  in  the  relation  of  teacher  and 
student  in  the  out-of-door  life  stripped  of  all  but  es- 
sentials. Each  boy  followed  his  own  bent,  whether  for 
music  or  art  or  literature  or  science.  There  was  all  the 
healthy  play  they  wished,  for  he  felt  that  in  his  own  case 
and  in  that  of  most  high-bred  and  well-to-do  Indian  boys, 
something  of  the  pure  joy  of  living  had  been  lost  to  them 
by  the  fact  that  they  were  too  civilized  to  run  about  and 
tumble  into  the  dust  and  water  when  they  pleased.  So 
they  had  missed  the  joys  of  physical  sensation  and  even 
of  mischievous  enterprise  which  poor  boys  the  world 
over  enjoy. 

At  the  same  time  he  welcomed  all  the  fresh  imagina- 
tion of  childhood  in  the  making  of  his  own  poetry. 
When  he  finished  a  poem  he  would  sing  it  to  the  boys 
while  it  was  still  in  its  first  bloom — for  the  poems  which 
we  know  only  in  prose  translations  are,  in  the  original, 
songs  set  to  lovely  and  haunting  music  of  Bengal.  The 
children  would  come  in  crowds  to  hear  the  singing,  and 
would  learn  them  and  sing  them,  too,  gathering  in 
groups  to  sing  under  the  open  sky  on  moonlit  nights,  or 


310  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

in  the  shadows  of  the  lowering  rain-clouds  of  July. 
Sometimes  they  would  act  out  little  plays  which  the 
poet  wrote,  or  would  become  ambitious  and  write  poetry 
in  imitation  of  his  and  sing  it  to  each  other.  To-morrow 
he  would  show  us  the  pictures  for  the  very  simple  stage- 
sets  that  they  used  when  they  gave  The  Cycle  of  Spring 
with  the  Poet  himself  as  an  actor. 

The  Poet  broke  off  his  explanation  of  Shantiniketan  to 
point  out  a  group  of  his  young  mystics.  They  were  not 
worshipping  the  beauty  of  the  declining  sun,  nor  yet  sing- 
ing in  groups  beneath  the  shining  sky.  They  were  play- 
ing football  and  yelling  like  anything  but  proper 
young  Brahmins,  and,  as  they  played,  the  dust  that  they 
kicked  up  turned  golden  around  them  in  the  sunshine, 
and  each  lively  figure  moved  in  its  own  halo  of  light. 

Even  as  we  looked,  the  sun  touched  the  horizon,  and 
almost  immediately  the  shadow  of  night  moved  up  the 
sky,  touching  us  with  the  awe  which  this  unheralded 
intrusion  of  the  tropical  darkness  into  the  very  midst  of 
daylight  inevitably  brings.  As  we  turned  to  walk  home- 
ward, we  could  see  our  house  only  by  the  flickering  of  a 
candle  which  Abdul  must  have  lighted,  and  the  great 
stars  were  flaming  on  all  the  horizons  around  us.  Bea- 
trice asked  the  Poet  whether  he  had  faith  in  the  science 
of  astrology  which  is  everywhere  believed  in  India. 
Could  one  really  read  the  secrets  of  life  in  the  stars? 
The  Poet  answered  in  a  tone  of  placid  tolerance: 

"I  am  still  waiting  for  a  demonstration.  How  can  I 
tell  what  may  be  done  among  the  stars?  They  look  so 
wise  that  one  might  fancy  that  they  know  all  about  us." 

Still  in  pursuit  of  the  secrets  of  Indian  mysticism, 
Beatrice  asked  whether  it  was  really  true  that  he  always 
took  an  hour  of  meditation  at  night  on  an  upper  bal- 
cony under  the  stars.  He  answered  lightly  that  he  loved 


A  GUEST  OF  TAGORE  311 

the  stars  and  meditated  much  at  all  times  on  that  upper 
balcony.  More  soberly  he  admitted  that  to  take  some 
little  time  during  the  day  to  be  simply  quiet,  to  abstract 
the  mind  from  all  earthly  worries  and  cares,  and  think, 
if  one  thinks  at  all,  only  of  the  ultimate  end  and  mean- 
ing of  life,  is  the  source  of  mental  and  spiritual  poise — 
a  bath  and  balm  for  the  soul. 

Then,  dropping  the  serious  tone,  he  spoke  with  some 
amusement  of  the  good  ladies  in  America  who  had  come 
to  him  for  instruction  in  mysticism. 

"What  could  I  teach  them?"  he  said  half  deprecat- 
ingly.  "They  did  not  want  to  hear  what  I  could  really 
tell  them.  It  was  too  simple  and  obvious,  not  wonder- 
ful and  mysterious  enough." 

With  such  speech  between  us,  we  came  to  a  parting  of 
the  trails.  The  Poet  turned  away  to  a  dim  glow  of  light 
which  marked  his  own  house,  and  we  followed  the  beck- 
oning flame  of  Abdul's  candle  to  our  own  bungalow. 


CHAPTER  XL 

CHOTA   HAZRI 

A  FEW  minutes  later  dinner  arrived  by  messenger 
across  the  fields,  and  was  served  by  Abdul  in  the  dim 
circle  of  light  made  by  a  small  oil  lamp.  Abdul  was  dis- 
dainful, though  silent.  He  could  not  see  why  his  mem- 
sahibs  had  chosen  to  come  to  such  an  empty  hole.  Primi- 
tive simplicity  and  mysticism  had  no  charms  for  him. 

Out  of  deference  to  us  the  dinner  consisted  of  the 
usual  meat  courses  of  an  English  meal,  though,  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  best  Indian  usage,  diet  is  vegetarian 
at  Shantiniketan.  I  must  confess  that  we  felt  a  little 
ashamed  of  our  fleshly  tastes.  It  suddenly  seemed  vul- 
gar to  be  carnivorous. 

As  Beatrice  and  I  sat  there,  looking  into  each  other's 
faces  in  that  dim  circle  of  light  environed  in  darkness, 
alone  in  our  little  house,  we  suddenly  felt  a  great 
strangeness  and  loneliness.  Our  hosts  seemed  to  us 
alien  and  far  away.  We  could  barely  discern  the  glow 
of  the  Poet's  house  in  the  distance.  Outside  there  was 
only  darkness  and  silence  and  a  million  stars.  Beatrice 
moved  her  chair  nearer  to  mine  and  squeezed  my  hand 
under  the  table-cloth.  Unreasoning  terror  was  falling 
upon  us.  The  darkness  seemed  electric,  and  we  uncon- 
sciously kept  straining  our  ears  for  footsteps  and  voices 
that  never  came.  Whenever  Abdul  moved,  Beatrice 
started  nervously.  Yet  her  eyes  followed  him  with  a 
certain  trust  and  comfort.  This  was  the  first  time  she 
had  spent  a  night  in  India  away  from  the  protection  of 

312 


CHOTA  HAZEI  313 

her  husband.  As  for  me,  I  was  used  to  it,  and  inclined 
to  be  a  bit  practical  and  heartless.  After  the  first  gas]) 
of  fear,  I  forgot  all  about  it,  and  let  Beatrice  manoeuvre 
me  into  the  bed  nearest  the  door  and  the  window  with- 
out protest. 

At  once  the  waves  of  sleep  enclosed  me  like  the  waters 
of  a  warm  sea.  I  was  rudely  drawn  back  to  conscious- 
ness by  a  restless  movement  and  a  meek  little  honied 
voice  saying: 

"Marjorie,  a  tiger  could  easily  get  in  here." 

"Could  he?"  I  answered  sleepily.  "He  wouldn't 
bother.  Think  of  all  the  nice  little  brown  boys  he  could 
dine  on  before  he  got  to  us." 

"But  there  are  tigers  in  Bengal,"  she  persisted. 

"Well,  never  mind,"  I  answered.  "I'm  right  under 
the  window.  He'll  surely  eat  me  first." 

"Abdul,"  she  called.    "Where  are  you?" 

Abdul,  it  seems,  was  sleeping  on  the  floor  in  the  next 
room. 

"I  think  you'd  better  sleep  there,"  said  the  heartless 
little  minx,  pointing  out  a  place  where  Abdul  would  lie 
right  across  the  threshold  outside. 

Abdul  sleepily  complied. 

"You  want  to  make  doubly  sure,"  I  remarked.  "Now 
you  are  perfectly  safe.  If  the  tiger  comes  through  the 
window  he  will  eat  me.  If  he  comes  through  the  door, 
he  will  eat  Abdul.  Now  you  have  nothing  more  to  worry 
about,  and  can  go  to  sleep." 

"Abdul,"  said  she  nervously,  "don't  you  think  you  had 
better  light  the  lamp  again?" 

Abdul  lit  the  lamp. 

"That,"  I  suppose,"  said  I,  "is  to  show  the  tiger  just 
where  we  are." 

I  must  have  fallen  asleep  then.    For  I  came  to  again 


314  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

out  of  a  moment  of  peace  and  silence  to  find  Beatrice 
audibly  meditating  on  the  probability  that  we  would  be 
carried  off  in  our  sleep  to  a  harem.  Indian  harems,  she 
said,  do  contain  captured  white  women.  This  was  too 
much ! 

"Yes,  Beatrice,"  I  sputtered  sleepily.  "There's  only 
one  form  of  destruction  you  are  not  likely  to  meet  be- 
fore morning.  You  can't  be  swallowed  by  a  man-eating 
shark." 

She  was  still  rational  enough  to  giggle  at  this.  In  the 
midst  of  the  giggle  I  fell  asleep  and  knew  no  more  till  a 
white  streak  of  sunshine  fell  hot  across  my  face  and 
awoke  me  with  a  start.  It  was  six  o'clock  in  the  morn- 
ing. A  boy  was  waiting  outside  with  chota  hazri  for  us. 
Chota  hazri  is  morning  tea,  one  of  the  most  delightful 
institutions  of  India.  It  appears  with  toast,  and  some- 
times with  fruit,  along  with  the  first  daylight,  and  is 
served  by  an  officious  boy  at  one's  bedside.  It  saves  one 
all  the  trouble  of  alarm  clocks  and  other  self -waking  in- 
stitutions, and  makes  of  arising  and  dressing  a  social 
occasion. 

But  this,  we  discovered,  was  no  ordinary  chota  hazri. 
Our  kindly  host  thought  he  knew  the  tastes  of  American 
girls,  and  so  with  the  tea  appeared  an  enormous  cake 
sugared  and  frosted  and  decorated  with  cherries,  and  all 
full  of  citron,  nuts,  and  raisins.  Nothing  like  that  ever 
grew  in  the  desert.  It  had  come  all  the  way  from  Cal- 
cutta in  our  honour. 

"Shades  of  college  proctors,"  said  I,  by  way  of  an- 
nouncing its  advent  to  Beatrice.  Never  in  my  wildest 
academic  dissipations  in  the  way  of  midnight  fudge  and 
Welsh  rabbit  had  I  thought  of  eating  a  cake  like  that  at 
six  o'clock  in  the  morning.  But  Beatrice  and  I  were 
not  going  to  miss  any  thrills  which  India  might  hold 


CHOTA  HAZRI  ;nr> 

for  us,  gastric  or  otherwise.  Hopping  over  to  a  station 
on  my  red  blanket,  she  helped  me  to  balance  the  cake 
between  us,  and  we  fell  to.  Half  way  through  we 
stopped  in  aching  and  satiated  helplessness.  I  have 
often  wondered  what  became  of  the  other  half  of  that 
concoction.  Did  some  little  nivstic  in  the  making  con- 

«/  o 

sume  it,  I  wonder,  and  turn  his  thoughts  from  the  stars 
to  the  mysteries  of  a  stomach  ache? 

The  next  morning  we  spent  in  wandering  about  among 
the  buildings  of  the  school.  We  walked  down  the  road 
bordered  with  trees  on  which  Tagore  himself  likes  to 
pace  back  and  forth  and  which  is  known  as  the  Poet's 
Walk ;  we  saw  the  stone  slab  which  marks  the  favourite 
place  of  meditation  of  the  Poet's  father;  we  went 
through  the  simple  dormitories  where  each  boy  owns  a 
bed  and  a  place  for  his  books,  and  nothing  more ;  we  saw 
the  out-of-door  pavilion  where  the  Poet  likes  to  hold 
classes;  and  we  called  upon  the  Poet  himself  in  the  little 
building  that  forms  his  library.  It  was  the  only  one  of 
the  bungalows  which  had  anything  of  luxury  about  it. 
Here  the  piled-up  dignity  of  books  and  pictures,  with 
some  busts  and  ornaments,  and  the  spacious  work-table, 
gave  an  impression  of  abundance  and  comfort  in  con- 
trast with  the  austerity  of  everything  else. 

After  lunch  Lady  Tagore,  whom  we  had  seen  for  only 
a  moment  the  previous  evening,  came  to  call  on  us. 
"With  rings  on  her  fingers  and  bells  on  her  toes,"  re- 
marked Beatrice,  and  the  quotation  was  far  more  literal 
in  its  application  than  it  usually  is.  She  was  a  lovely 
creature,  and  the  asceticism  that  elsewhere  prevailed 
had  no  part  in  her  costume  of  crimson  gauze,  and  the 
bracelets  and  hammered-gold  chains  that  adorned  her. 

The  Poet  followed  her,  and  we  fell  into  an  amusing 
chat  in  which  she  took  small  part,  save  to  murmur 


316  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

"Yes"  and  "No"  with  lovely,  downcast  eyes.  Then  we 
took  our  departure.  I  mean  we  began  to  take  it — for  the 
actual  going  proved  to  be  a  most  leisurely  matter.  We 
had  rashly  volunteered  our  wish  to  ride  once  in  an  ox- 
cart. The  ox-cart  is  the  really  characteristic  native  con- 
veyance, and  moves  at  the  rate  of  a  mile  an  hour  and  this 
under  the  stimulus  of  an  Indian  boy  who  encourages  the 
oxen  by  tweaking  their  tails. 

Fortunately  our  journey  was  only  a  mile  long,  though 
it  took  sixty  minutes  to  make  it.  When  we  were  safely 
on  our  own  train,  bound  for  other  adventures  and  sacred 
spots,  we  blessed  its  beautiful  swiftness  and  felt  that 
even  in  India  modern  civilization  has  its  compensations. 
And  so  we  rode  away,  leaving  behind  us  the  sunshine 
and  the  little  adobe  shack  that  had  been  home  to  us  for 
a  day  and  a  night,  but  carrying  with  us,  to  keep  for  ever, 
the  memory  of  the  Poet  who  had  made  us,  for  a  little 
time,  partakers  in  his  peace. 


CHAPTER  XLI 

UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TREE 

FAR  off  the  highways  and  tourist  trails  of  India  there 
is  a  sacred  and  sunny  place  to  which  for  two  thousand 
years  the  pilgrim  feet  of  Asia  have  worn  a  path.  For 
here  the  Lord  Buddha  beheld  the  way  to  peace.  It  was 
on  the  road  to  Buddha  Gaya  that  Kim  and  his  Lama 
were  temporarily  annexed  by  the  vituperative  old 
woman ;  and  on  that  same  path  Kim  fell  in  with  his  un- 
known father's  regiment,  and  became,  though  unwil- 
lingly, for  some  time  a  Sahib  and  the  son  of  a  Sahib. 
And  now,  while  those  who  travel  by  guide-books  from 
hotel  to  hotel  pass  it  by  for  the  more  obvious  appeals  of 
Benares,  ever  and  again  some  white  man  mingles  with 
the  strange  assembly  of  Oriental  devotees  that  seek 
it  out — a  scholar,  perhaps,  a  reader  of  strange  books,  or 
may  be  a  dreaming  theosophist. 

Beatrice  assured  me  that  my  visit  to  India  would  be 
worth  no  more  than  a  ride  around  New  York  in  a  sub- 
way, unless  I  could  stand  under  the  tree  where  Buddha, 
the  Holy  One,  received  his  enlightenment.  After  that, 
she  thought,  we  might  still  walk  in  the  ways  of  the 
gods  till  we  came  to  the  Ganges  at  Benares.  As  for 
the  gods,  I  thought  her  own  Italian  saints  were  jollier 
folk,  and  vastly  more  intelligible.  They  didn't  grow 
six  arms  and  one  or  two  superfluous  heads  like  the 
Hindu  gods  of  Benares,  and  they  found  time  to  play 
with  dimpled  little  Christ-childs  instead  of  merely  sit- 
ting on  their  feet  like  Buddha,  and  staring  blankly  into 

317 


318  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Eternity.  These  reactions,  Beatrice  said,  merely  showed 
that  I  had  not  the  soul  of  a  Mystic. 

So,  for  the  time  being,  under  her  tutelage  I  became  a 
pilgrim  at  strange  shrines.  Obediently  I  agreed  to  fol- 
low her  on  the  way  of  the  gods  if  she  would  then  follow 
me  among  the  passionate  sensual  loves  and  spacious  am- 
bitions of  the  great  queen  of  the  north  who  "Empress  of 
all  the  Indies,  with  unlimited  power,  unlimited  resources 
at  her  command,  lay  behind  silken  screens,  in  a  mar- 
vellous tent  of  Kashmir  shawls,  held  up  by  solid  silver- 
gilt  and  set  with  precious  stones." 

"That,  Beatrice,"  said  I,  "was  really  the  life." 

But  Beatrice  read  me  the  story  of  that  other  queen, 
"Mayadevi,  beautiful  as  the  water-lily  and  pure  in  mind 
as  the  lotus.  As  queen  of  heaven  she  lived  on  earth,  un- 
tainted by  desire  and  immaculate.  ...  At  Lumbini 
there  is  a  beautiful  grove  .  .  .  where  the  trees  were 
one  mass  of  fragrant  blossoms."  There  one  day  the 
queen  left  her  golden  palanquin  to  wander  among  the 
flowers,  and  there  the  Buddha  was  born,  while  "four 
pure  angels  of  Brahma  held  out  a  golden  net  to  receive 
the  babe,  who  came  forth  from  her  side  like  the  rising 
sun,  bright  and  perfect." 

So  we  matched  queen  against  queen  as  we  rode  forth 
into  the  sunset  on  that  jogging  Indian  train.  There 
seemed  to  be  no  other  white  women  on  board — only 
dusky  station-guards  who  looked  in  on  us  at  every  stop, 
and  dark-faced,  barefooted  servants  who  thrust  cha  and 
bread  spread  with  buffalo  butter  through  our  windows. 
Night  swooped  down  upon  us  swiftly,  annihilating  all 
the  outer  landscape.  The  first-class  compartment 
seemed  suddenly  small  and  intimate  and  strangely  de- 
tached from  all  the  world.  We  looked  at  each  other 
half-blankly  for  a  moment,  realizing  once  more  how 


UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TREE      310 

alone  we  were,  like  two  souls  journeying  in  a  lighted 
balloon  through  black  space. 

Sleep  in  that  dusty  compartment  did  not  look  inviting, 
but  we  slept  at  last  in  utter  weariness,  fitfully.,  fever- 
ishly, startled  continually  by  a  gibberish  of  strange 
tongues  without.  Very  early  in  the  morning  I  awoke 
with  my  mouth  and  eyes  full  of  fine  dust.  Outside  there 
was  a  glare  of  golden  sunshine  on  an  empty  golden  land. 
Abdul  appeared  and  indicated  that  we  should  soon  be  at 
Buddha  Gaya,  and  for  a  time  the  toil  of  our  pilgrimage 
was  ended. 

Under  his  efficient  guidance  we  soon  stopped  at  a  little 
station  set  in  the  midst  of  a  bright  vacuum  of  sunlight, 
and  were  stowed  in  a  trap,  which,  it  seemed,  would  take 
us  to  a  dak-bungalow.  The  dak-bungalow  is  a  unique 
and  blessed  institution  of  the  white  man's  India.  It  is 
an  inn  for  travellers  maintained  by  the  British  govern- 
ment at  points  where  there  is  not  enough  traffic  to  sup- 
port a  hotel.  Any  one  may  claim  its  protection  for 
twenty-four  hours.  If  no  one  comes  to  supplant  him,  he 
may  of  course  stay  longer,  but  the  newcomer  always  has 
the  advantage,  since  it  is  assumed  that  in  twenty-four 
hours  one  may,  if  necessary,  learn  enough  about  one's  en- 
vironment to  find  other  shelter,  and  the  whole  point  of 
the  dak-bungalow  is  that  it  can  be  counted  upon  as  an 
immediate  asylum.  The  dak-bungalow  may  be  anything 
from  a  tea-station,  consisting  of  a  roof  supported  by 
sticks,  to  a  spacious  and  restful  inn.  The  bungalow  to 
which  Abdul  conducted  us  seemed  to  us  that  morning 
the  very  essence  of  hospitality.  It  stood  in  a  rich 
shadow  of  palms  beneath  which  some  honest  English 
grass  had  half  succeeded  in  growing.  Many  things  that 
we  take  for  granted  are  not  universal  throughout  the 
world,  and  a  green  lawn  is  one  of  them — it  is  almost  en- 


320  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

tirely  an  Occidental  institution ;  so  there  was  something 
lovely  and' homelike  in  that  carpet  of  green  beneath  the 
palms.  We  drove  up  through  flowering  shrubs  to  a  low 
bungalow  half  mantled  in  green  and  stepped  out  upon 
a  screened  veranda  opening  into  two  dim,  cool  rooms. 
Immediately  a  servant  in  white  appeared,  as  if  he  had 
been  expecting  us,  and  another  came  pattering  to  our 
side  with  cold  water  and  tea,  and  all  the  dust  of  the 
journey  vanished  in  cleanliness  and  peace. 

We  were  the  only  guests.  It  seemed  like  one  of  those 
hospitable  old  fables  in  which  the  knight  in  the  en- 
chanted woods  comes  to  an  empty  house  where  all  seems 
ready  for  his  reception,  though  there  is  no  host  to  greet 
him,  and  meals  and  baths  and  fresh  clothing  appear  by 
magic  served  by  unseen  hands.  So  it  was  with  us.  A 
bath  was  forthwith  ready,  and  then  a  four-course  break- 
fast that  seemed  to  our  American  tastes  more  like  lunch 
than  the  first  gastric  venture  of  the  day.  We  ate  it 
leisurely,  luxuriating  in  the  beauty  and  the  quietude 
without. 

It  was  now  about  half  past  ten  in  the  morning.  Be- 
yond the  shadows  of  our  retreat,  the  sun  burned  hotly, 
with  a  flash  of  white  houses  and  a  wide  sweep  of  yellow 
land.  In  the  green  leaves  close  to  the  veranda  there  was 
a  buzz  and  a  movement,  as  of  little  living  things.  Some- 
times a  voice  came  to  us,  calling  strange  things  in  an 
alien  tongue,  and  now  and  again  there  was  a  tinkle  of 
bells  and  a  patter  of  feet  in  the  dust.  But  for  the  most 
part  the  scene  was  environed  in  silence.  The  opulence 
and  mellowness  of  eternal  summer  lay  upon  the  land. 
Nor  was  it  the  swooning  languor  of  the  tropics  either; 
for  the  air  was  dry,  and  a  breeze  blew  purely  and 
freshly  among  the  palms  with  a  pattering  sound. 


For  a  time  we  simply  luxuriated — in  a  peace  more 
sensuous  than  Tagore's  desert,  more  drowsing  and  com- 
forting to  the  flesh,  carrying  with  it  more  of  slumber 
and  dreams. 

Then  Beatrice  aroused  me. 

"If  we  are  to  see  the  shrine  of  Buddha,"  she  said,  "we 
must  go  before  the  sun  is  too  high,  for  Herbert  sched- 
uled us  only  a  day  in  this  lonely  place,  and  we  must 
leave  at  twelve  o'clock  to-night." 

So,  fortifying  ourselves  with  more  tea,  we  woke  Abdul 
from  a  premature  siesta  and  set  forth  in  a  conveyance 
which  in  India  is  called  a  gharry,  a  corruption,  appar- 
ently, of  the  English  word  carry.  Before  us  the  high- 
way lay  wide,  white,  and  dusty,  patterned  here  and  there 
with  the  sharp  black  shade  of  palms.  And  as  we  rattled 
forth  upon  it,  I  looked  out  with  a  sudden  start  as  upon 
a  dream  at  last  come  true.  For  there  lay  the  real  Orient 
before  me,  the  Orient  I  had  been  seeking  from  Kobe  to 
Calcutta  and  had  never  yet  beheld  in  the  flesh.  For  to 
me,  as  to  most  people,  the  word  Orient  had  conjured  up 
an  image  complex  and  a  little  vague  yet  full  of  quite 
definite  details.  And  there  it  was  before  me — low  white 
houses,  and  maidens  bearing  brazen  water-bowls  upon 
their  heads;  white  pagodas  beneath  the  palms,  and  a 
saint  cross-legged  in  meditation;  figures  in  draperies 
and  turbans  posing  against  an  eternity  of  sunshine; 
and  here  and  there  the  glitter  of  golden  spires  and  the 
half-confessed  presence  of  shrines  and  invisible  priests. 
Everywhere  I  turned  there  was  a  new  stage-set,  and  all 
the  right  characters  were  there,  too,  from  a  bad  little 
boy,  shrilly  demolishing  the  reputation  of  an  old  woman, 
to  a  patriarchal  dignitary  in  a  beard  as  long  as 
Abraham's  and  majesty  to  match.  Then  Beatrice 
cried : 


322  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

"Marjorie,  see  him — the  dear,  darling,  lovely,  beauti- 
ful beast." 

I  turned  to  see  a  camel  casually  reaching  for  a  meal 
in  the  top  of  a  tree  where  the  shoots  grew  tender  and 
fresh.  I  could  scarcely  restrain  Beatrice  from  jumping 
out  forthwith  and  embracing  the  long  legs  of  this  old 
friend  of  her  childhood.  Buddha  was  for  a  time  quite 
secondary  to  her  rapturous  contemplation  of  every  new 
specimen  of  an  animal  which  she  averred  was  the  kindest 
and  the  wisest  in  all  the  kingdom  of  beasts. 

Meanwhile  we  had  collected  a  retinue  of  beggars.  An 
old  man,  leaning  on  a  staff,  held  up  our  gharry  and 
avowed  that  I  was  his  grandfather  and  his  grandmother 
— which  was  a  polite  way  of  indicating  my  responsibility 
for  his  support  and  nurture.  It  was  a  responsibility 
that  I  evaded,  since  a  willingness  to  scatter  cash  brings 
the  whole  population  of  an  Oriental  town  on  one's  heels 
forthwith  and  banishes  peace  for  the  duration  of  one's 
sojourn.  Whereupon  he  told  me  that  I  was  no  better 
than  I  should  be  and  my  mother —  Before  he  got  to  my 
grandmother,  Abdul  burst  in  from  his  swinging  seat  on 
the  back  of  our  gharry  and  told  the  old  rascal  the  com- 
plete and  unsavoury  history  of  his  own  ancestors.  The 
copious  and  brilliant  volley  of  Oriental  abuse  which 
Abdul  thenceforth  scattered  permitted  us  to  go  our  way 
without  obstruction,  though  not  without  drama  and 
noise. 

Soon  we  passed  into  the  thick  shade  of  trees  in  the 
midst  of  which  rose  a  multitude  of  spires.  In  the  centre 
there  dawned  on  us  the  great  central  structure  of 
Buddha's  shrine,  a  kind  of  fantastic  pyramid  fash- 
ioned with  a  multitude  of  carvings,  mounting  far 
above  the  shade  of  the  trees.  It  was  gilded — though  the 
gilt  was  fresh  only  in  patches — with  the  offerings  of  the 


UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TREE  :JU:>, 

pilgrims  who  conie  hither  and  give  their  quota  of  gold 
to  be  applied  in  fine  gold  leaf  upon  the  stone.  We  en- 
tered by  a  path  lined  with  shrubs  and  were  promptly 
thronged  by  the  beggars  and  lepers  who  sit  there  as  pen- 
sioners upon  the  generosity  of  those  who  come  to  honour 
one  who,  like  Christ  himself,  had  never  retained  silver 
or  gold  to  give  away. 

Abdul  conducted  us  to  the  door  of  the  shrine,  some- 
what disdainful  the  while.  For  he  himself  was  an  ex- 
Mohammedan,  now  turned  Christian,  though  without 
any  visible  accession  of  Christian  graces,  and  so  this 
pursuit  of  the  Buddha  was  to  him  doubly  idolatrous. 
We  kept  passing  pilgrims — and  very  different  they  were 
from  the  majority  of  those  who  come  to  great  shrines. 
The  interesting  thing  about  them  was  that  they  seemed 
many  of  them  of  strange  races  and  peoples  whom  one 
never  sees  in  an  Oriental  metropolis — men  from  inland 
monasteries  in  China  and  centres  of  Buddhist  lore  set 
high  among  the  mountains  of  Tibet.  Among  them  was 
a  fine  old  abbot  in  a  yellow  robe  who  might  well  have 
been  Kim's  own  Lama.  Few  of  them  had  Indian  faces; 
the  Mongolian  almost  entirely  predominated.  For 
Buddha  was  one  of  those  prophets  who  are  not  without 
honour  save  in  their  own  country,  and  the  traces  of  his 
cleansing  and  pacific  influence  long  since  disappeared 
from  his  own  land  in  favour  of  the  popular  faith  which 
we  were  to  see  in  all  its  splendour  and  pathos  of  devo- 
tion at  Benares. 

A  priest  came  out  and  greeted  us  in  a  limited  assort- 
ment of  English  words.  He  offered  to  escort  us  around 
the  gardens.  With  him  we  went  on  a  little  stroll  along 
the  shaded  path,  stopping  now  and  then  to  look  in  at 
some  golden  image  of  Buddha  in  a  shrine.  We  paused 
under  the  tree  which,  he  claimed,  had  descended  in  an 


324  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

unbroken  line  from  the  Bodhi-tree,  and  he  gave  us  two 
leaves  of  it  to  carry  away.  In  halting  English  rein- 
forced by  Beatrice's  brilliant  and  imaginative  inter- 
pretation, he  told  us  the  story  of  the  Buddha — how 
long  ago  the  young  Prince  Siddhartha,  blessed  with  all 
the  gifts  that  God  ever  bestowed  upon  a  youth  (with 
beauty  and  virtue,  with  wealth  and  honour  and  the  love 
of  his  people,  with  the  most  winsome  of  wives  and  a  dear 
little  baby  son )  could  not  be  happy,  because  he  saw  that 
all  the  world  was  miserable,  and  that  the  life  of  man  was 
one  long  losing  fight  with  death,  which  might  be  held  off 
awhile  by  the  sacrifice  of  one's  energies  to  the  attain- 
ment of  food  and  shelter,  but  which  in  the  end  must  in- 
exorably conquer;  how,  seeing  this,  "even  as  men  desire 
to  give  happiness  to  their  children,  he  desired  to  give 
peace  to  the  world" ;  how  he  stole  away  by  night — leav- 
ing all  he  loved  behind  him — to  seek  a  spiritual  medi- 
cine for  the  pain  of  the  world. 

Here  Beatrice  interposed  with  the  story  of  the  prince's 
visit  to  the  room  of  his  sleeping  wife,  that  he  might  take 
one  more  glimpse  of  his  best  beloved.  His  baby  son  lay 
in  the  arms  of  his  mother.  And  he  longed  to  kiss  the 
little  one,  but  he  lay  so  close  to  his  mother's  bosom  that 
the  prince  could  not  touch  him  without  awaking  both. 
So  he  stood  there  gazing,  as  if  he  could  never  take  his 
eyes  away,  till  the  thought  of  the  love  he  was  resigning 
brought  tears  to  his  eyes,  and  he  hurried  out  and  rode 
away  swiftly  under  the  stars,  surrendering  for  ever  the 
ties  of  human  love,  but  not  their  memory. 

The  priest  was  a  bit  impatient  of  this  sentimental  in- 
terruption which  Beatrice  later  substantiated  by  line 
and  chapter  in  the  gospel  of  Buddha.  He  went  on  to  tell 
us,  with  controversial  fervour,  how  Siddhartha  sought 
enlightenment  from  Heaven  at  the  gaudy  shrines  of  the 


UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TEEE  325 

gods — like  those  at  Benares,  for  instance — and  found 
that  there  was  no  answer  to  the  riddle  of  life  in  sacri- 
fices and  ritual  and  graven  images;  how  he  sought  peace 
in  the  life  of  the  ascetic  and  found  that  to  abuse  the 
body  makes  one  think  the  more  of  it  and  clouds  the 
mind ;  and  how  at  last  he  came  to  this  tree  and  sat  down 
to  meditate  on  the  trouble  of  the  world.  And  here  at 
last  the  answer  came  to  him.  He  saw  that  all  men  are 
miserable  and  bring  misery  on  each  other,  because  they 
desire  too  much — because  each  is  enclosed  in  the  wall  of 
his  own  sensations  and  wishes  and  cannot  see  beyond 
them  to  the  good  of  the  whole.  To  stop  wanting  any- 
thing in  the  world  is  the  beginning  of  peace;  and  to  lay 
aside  all  selfishness,  all  interest  in  one's  self,  and  care 
only  for  others  becomes  in  the  end  the  culmination  of 
joy.  So  the  priest  struggled  to  tell  us,  while  Beatrice 
interpreted  in  swift  and  eager  phrases. 

We  returned  to  the  shrine,  and,  entering,  signed  the 
record  of  our  pilgrimage  in  the  presence  of  a  great 
golden  and  painted  image  of  the  Buddha.  We  had  to  tell 
not  merely  our  names  but  our  "caste.'1 

"Say  American/'  said  Beatrice,  and  she  wrote  it  down 
with  a  flourish.  Just  where  American  stands  in  the 
pyramid  of  pride,  learning,  and  pure  breeding  that  con- 
stitutes the  Hindu  caste-system  I  do  not  know — very 
near  the  bottom,  I  fear. 

When  we  had  registered,  a  priest  invited  us  to  make 
a  little  contribution  to  the  shrine.  Though  in  general 
I  dislike  being  held  up  by  strange  gods,  in  a  world  in 
which  there  are  so  many  Christian  uses  for  money,  we 
both  acceded  gladly — Beatrice  out  of  a  somewhat  ex- 
aggerated devotion  which  had  been  influenced  by  the 
theosophists  and  a  reaction  against  Catholic  priests,  and 
I  more  soberly  and  with  reservations.  For  I  was  glad  to 


32C  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

do  honour  to  the  saint  whose  teachings  I  had  found  the 
source  of  much  that  is  lovely  and  humane  in  the  East, 
from  Japan  to  Burma.  That  as  a  "philosopher"  his 
claims  upon  the  intellect  of  the  West  are  somewhat  exag- 
gerated, I  certainly  believe.  Whatever  it  may  be  to 
those  who  know  its  literature  intimately,  Buddhism,  at 
least  in  so  far  as  the  Occidental  may  judge  it,  seems  to 
me  inferior  in  imagination,  intelligence,  and  variety  of 
achievement,  as  well  as  in  basic  social  thinking,  to  the 
Christian  tradition  of  Europe.  Nor,  purely  in  his 
human  aspects,  is  its  founder  to  be  compared  with  the 
founder  of  Christianity.  He  remains  a  dim,  though 
certainly  a  pure  and  lovely  figure,  without  the  sparkle, 
the  humour,  the  vitality,  and  freshness  of  the  remark- 
able personality  of  the  Christian  gospels.  Yet  the 
genuine  beauty  and  sanity  of  Gautama's  life,  the  no- 
bility of  Buddhist  art,  the  humanity  and  wisdom  of 
the  Buddhist  work  of  civilization  in  the  East,  and 
the  fruits  of  its  long  and  beneficent  career  in  the  per- 
sonal refinement  of  life  and  manner  in  Buddhist  coun- 
tries like  Japan  and  Burma — might  well  challenge  the 
still  provincial  interests  of  our  scholars. 

This  I  tried  to  tell  Beatrice,  who  said  my  enthusiasm 
was  inadequate.  The  old  priest,  however,  seemed  to 
think  it  sufficient  to  deserve  further  hospitality,  for, 
after  glancing  at  our  contribution,  he  beckoned  to  us  to 
follow  in  his  wake.  We  travelled  down  a  shadowy  path 
and  through  a  door,  and  found  ourselves  in  the  court- 
yard of  a  great  white  monastery.  A  handsome  fellow 
with  flashing  dark  eyes  appeared  and  conducted  us  into 
a  little  winding  alley  absolutely  dark,  where  we  soon 
stumbled  against  some  steep  stone  steps.  Dismay  de- 
scended upon  us.  We  squeezed  each  other's  hands  re- 
assuringly, and  the  squeeze  said : 


UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TREE  327 

"Where  are  we  going?" 

"Perhaps  we  are  being  kidnapped." 

Abdul  had  been  left  outside.  The  dim  passageway 
was  very  short,  but  it  was  long  enough  to  let  us  reflect 
upon  the  foolishness  of  intrusting  one's  self  to  every 
handsome  turban  that  beckons  from  a  doorway.  We 
climbed  some  dark,  dusty  stairs  and  emerged  suddenly 
upon  an  open,  canopied  balcony.  Before  us  all  the 
courts  of  the  monastery  were  spread  out  like  a  map,  and 
monks  in  yellow  turbans  and  yellow  robes  were  pictur- 
esquely posing  before  various  household  tasks.  Bowing 
and  smiling,  our  guide  led  us  before  a  personage  with  a 
shaven  head  and  a  light  negligee  garment,  who  sat  before 
great  books,  turning  the  pages  and  half  chanting  to  him- 
self as  he  read.  Before  him  there  was  a  long  silver  pipe 
on  a  kind  of  stand  level  with  his  mouth,  and,  without 
touching  it  with  his  hands,  he  smoked  serenely  as  he 
read.  He  paused,  bowed  slightly,  and,  glancing  at  us 
with  faint  curiosity,  went  on  reading.  Our  guide  pro- 
duced a  stool  for  us  and  a  rug,  and  we  sat  down  before 
the  dignitary. 

Beatrice's  eyes  telegraphed  to  me:  "Why  are  we 
here?" 

My  lips  formed  a  soundless  answer :  "A  little  lesson  in 
mysticism." 

Furtively  we  looked  around.  Below,  a  monk  went 
on  polishing  a  brass  bowl.  Somewhere  some  one  was 
droning.  Sheer  bashfulness  descended  upon  us.  What 
were  we  to  do,  now  that  we  had  been  received  in  such 
state? 

The  personage  broke  the  silence  by  glancing  up  and 
articulating  the  word : 

"Inglis?" 

"American,"  we  said. 


328  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

The  monk  bowed  and  smiled  intelligently  as  if  to  say 
that  he  knew  Americans. 

Conversation  lagged.  How  could  it  be  otherwise? 
When  he  spoke  no  English,  and  we  spoke  no — what  did 
he  speak,  anyway?  The  monk  was  perfectly  at  ease. 
Genial  and  polished,  he  carried  off  all  the  social  honours. 
He  brought  out  a  book  to  show  us,  scrawled  over  with 
strange  characters  and  interlinear  phrases  here  and 
there  in  English, — mostly  references  to  Lord  Buddha, — 
the  work  of  some  devotee  struggling  at  once  with  the 
mysteries  of  faith  and  language.  Everywhere  there  were 
hints  of  white  men  who  had  come  and  gone  here, 
and  had  tried  to  learn  a  little;  yet  no  one,  not  even  the 
personage,  seemed  to  know  English. 

The  book  helped  for  a  moment,  like  a  photograph -al- 
bum at  a  country  party.  Then  embarrassment  de- 
scended on  us  again.  Beatrice  telegraphed : 

"Can  we  go?" 

I  telegraphed:  "How?" 

The  monk  once  more  attempted  to  relieve  the  situa- 
tion. He  was  evidently  searching  in  his  consciousness 
for  another  English  word,  which  finally  emerged: 
"Luns?" 

He  was  inquiring  whether  we  would  have  lunch.  Our 
social  panic  reached  its  climax.  If  we  didn't  know  what 
to  do  when  we  were  merely  sitting  and  enjoying  a  pleas- 
ant prospect,  how  should  we  get  through  a  meal?  Bea- 
trice arose  with  decision,  and  smiling,  with  a  little 
gracious  sweep  of  her  hand,  indicated  that  we  would  go. 
The  monk  bowed,  and  without  a  word  led  us  down 
through  the  dark  passageway  and  out  into  the  garden. 
Free! 

And  all  the  time  they  had  merely  mistaken  us  for  in- 
quiring theosophists.  Late  that  afternoon,  when,  after 


UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TREE  329 

a  siesta  and  a  cold  bath,  we  were  enjoying  afternoon  tea 
on  the  veranda  of  the  bungalow,  we  suddenly  appre- 
ciated what  had  been  expected  of  us.  For  a  trap  drove 
up,  and  a  little  white  man  emerged,  followed  by  bundles 
and  bundles  wrapped  in  cloth.  As  the  servant  dropped 
them  on  the  veranda,  the  cloth  fell  back,  revealing  books 
much  like  the  interlinear  tome  wre  had  looked  at.  The 
man  was  a  tiny  fellow — pale  and  all  awry ;  one  shoulder 
was  higher  than  the  other;  his  face  was  peculiarly  pal- 
lid ;  his  eyes  were  like  round  spots  of  blue  porcelain ;  and 
his  head  was  sparsely  covered  with  straw-coloured  hair. 
He  returned  for  tea  before  we  had  quite  finished,  and  at 
once  fell  into  conversation  with  us.  He  spoke  in  correct 
and  fluent  English  whose  struggling  r's  and  literary 
idioms  proclaimed  that  it  was  not  his  native  tongue. 
Finally  it  developed  that  he  was  a  Dutchman,  and  a 
theosophist,  just  returning  from  a  long  sojourn  in  a 
Himalayan  monastery  where  he  had  been  studying  the 
sacred  lore  of  Buddhism.  He  was  coming  to  the  monas- 
tery here,  with  letters  of  introduction.  It  was  obviously 
the  great  event  of  his  life.  He  hoped,  yet  scarcely  dared 
to  hope,  that  he  would  be  kindly  welcomed. 

When  we  told  him  how  we,  two  unheralded  women 
without  a  spark  of  theosophical  wisdom  in  our  heads, 
had  been  received,  his  amazement  flamed  in  a  blush  all 
over  his  pallid  face.  Eagerly  he  questioned  us :  what— 
what  was  it  all  like?  Had  we  seen — naming  some  one 
apparently  of  importance.  We  were  vague  and  ig- 
norant. As  we  mentioned  each  little  detail  of  the  life 
we  had  witnessed,  he  seized  upon  it  with  an  almost  pas- 
sionate understanding,  which  left  it  still  dark  to  us.  It 
was  as  if  we  were  lightly  describing  some  casual  nobody 
met  by  the  way,  whom  he  knew  to  be  veritably  a  god. 

Even  as  we  talked,  night  swooped  down  with  a  sudden 


330  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

flame  of  scarlet  in  the  sky,  the  stars  blazed  forth,  and  a 
cool  wind  came  up  and  rattled  among  the  palms.  Din- 
ner was  announced,  and  we  ate  it  with  him.  When  the 
velvet  night  drew  us  out  again  to  the  veranda  he  poured 
forth  a  flood  of  confidence,  like  one  who  has  had  no 
audience  for  a  long,  long  time.  He  told  us  about  his 
search  for  truth,  even  in  the  white  upper  reaches  of  the 
Himalayas — about  strange  stories  of  gods  who  dwell 
among  the  snows,  and  old,  old  saints  who  have  never 
died — how  he  himself  had  heard  and  witnessed  a  singing 
and  shining  that  had  no  earthly  source.  He  told,  too, 
of  a  mysterious  sense  of  communication  with  a  kindred 
soul  somewhere,  some  woman-soul  which  was  vibrating 
in  harmony  with  his,  which  he  was  destined  to  meet 
somewhere,  and  travel  in  companionship  upon  the  sacred 
quest  of  truth — a  high  intention  that  was  somehow 
mixed  up  with  plans  to  lecture  on  theosophy  in  America 
and  become  rich  and  honoured  as  a  sage  among  the  gen- 
erous and  credulous  folk  of  Southern  California. 

As  he  spoke  there  in  the  isolation  of  that  bungalow, 
we  three  alone  in  the  midst  of  an  alien  world  charged 
with  spiritual  and  ghostly  influences  through  twenty 
centuries,  Beatrice  listened  half  hypnotized,  her  beauti- 
ful, pathetic  eyes  and  fine  face  flaming  and  changing  in 
wonder  at  this  marvellous  man.  The  presence  there  in 
the  night  of  this  lovely  creature,  so  warm  and  respon- 
sive, loosened  some  pent-up  passion  that  even  saints  and 
sages  often  bring  back  to  civilization  from  long  and 
lonely  sojournings;  and  he  poured  forth  some  incoher- 
ent rapture  to  the  effect  that  she  was  the  mysterious 
woman-soul,  the  invisible  companion  hitherto  of  all  his 
meditations.  I  rescued  her  sharply  with  reminders  of 
prosaic  matters  of  packing  and  baggage,  and  a  train  that 
left  for  Benares  at  twelve  o'clock  that  night.  Beatrice 


UNDER  THE  BUDDHA  TREE  :$:U 

recovered,  and  made  her  adieu  with  cool  grace  and 
aplomb.  We  saw  no  more  of  our  theosophist. 

But  here  a  new  situation  faced  us.  Abdul  had  ab- 
sconded. With  dismay  I  remembered  Beatrice's  mis- 
chievous remark  at  dinner. 

"I  think,"  she  had  announced  coyly,  "that  our  Abdul 
has  found  a  sweetheart  here." 

There  had  been,  indeed,  an  air  of  vast  importance  and 
elation  about  Abdul,  and  that  evening  a  blaze  of  Oriental 
adornments  about  his  person  had  replaced  the  Western 
trappings  he  had  acquired  at  Herbert's  hands.  We  had 
thought  little  of  it.  But  now  as  midnight  and  the 
Benares  train  approached,  and  there  was  no  Abdul,  the 
whole  thing  took  on  a  different  aspect.  No  deserted 
wife  ever  cursed  the  wiles  of  the  other  woman  as  did 
we  while  we  sat  helpless  amid  our  baggage.  We 
strained  our  ears  against  the  darkness.  We  almost 
thought  we  heard  the  whistle  of  the  incoming  train 
somewhere  in  the  black  and  far-off  reaches  of  the  night. 

Just  as  we  had  decided  that  for  us  Benares  must  wait 
another  day,  Abdul  turned  up.  There  was  about  him 
an  air  of  secret  satisfaction — but  he  lied  serenely. 
What,  was  memsahib  worried?  He  had  merely  stepped 
out  to  get  a  clean  white  cloth  in  which  to  wrap  some  of 
memsahib's  superfluous  belongings.  How  could  meni- 
sahib  think  that  he,  Abdul,  could  have  any  interest  be- 
sides her?  No,  memsahib,  he  had  been  nowhere  at  all 
— only  waiting  for  memsahib  to  stop  talking  to  the 
Sahib  and  be  ready  to  go  to  Benares — and  a  few  minutes 
later  found  us  efficiently  deposited  on  the  train  and 
rattling  through  the  night  to  new  haunts  of  holiness. 


CHAPTEE  XLII 

THE  LOTUS  OF  THE  WORLD 

WE  crossed  the  Ganges  early  next  morning  and  saw 
Benares, — the  Holy  City  of  the  Hindus,  the  "Lotus  of 
the  World" — and  the  ghosts  of  its  shimmering  spires  on 
the  wide  floods  of  the  river,  pearly  white  in  the  mists  of 
dawn. 

"A  dirty  hole,"  remarked  an  Englishman  as  our  train 
stopped.  "More  smells  than  odours  of  sanctity  here,  I 
should  say,  and  more  lepers  than  gods." 

He  stepped  into  a  gharry  and  rode  disdainfully  away. 
Our  gharry  followed  his,  down  a  wide,  shaded  avenue  a 
little  dusty,  as  was  all  India  those  days,  and  inhabited 
by  a  whole  race  of  monkeys  and  some  vociferous  green 
parrots  who  screamed  their  good  mornings  to  us  and 
flew  protesting  into  the  sky.  We  stopped  at  a  little 
hotel,  a  low  white  bungalow  draped  in  a  purple  mass  of 
bougainvillea  that  seemed  like  something  transplanted 
from  Mexico  or  Southern  California. 

The  dirty  city,  with  its  piled  up  architecture  of  temple 
on  temple  and  shrine  on  shrine,  was  thronged  that  day 
with  moving  masses  of  worshippers  who  had  come — 
some  of  them  from  a  long,  long  distance — to  make  them- 
selves clean  in  the  holy  waters  of  the  Ganges.  All  the 
life — the  passionate,  thronging,  multi-coloured  life  of  the 
city — centred  in  the  river.  And  thither  we  turned,  and 
there  on  its  waters  we  spent  the  greater  part  of  the  day. 
We  saw  it  first  in  the  morning.  We  made  our  way  to  it 
through  winding  alleys  and  down  endless  steps  lined 

332 


THE  LOTUS  OP  THE  WORLD  333 

with  fruit-stands  which  offered  dirty  sweetmeats  for 
sale,  and  tissue  paper  nothings,  and  marigolds,  the  holy 
flower.  Our  way  was  crowded  with  the  maimed,  the 
sick,  and  the  dying.  For  if  one  is  sick,  the  holy  water 
will  perchance  make  one  well ;  and  if  one  must  die,  it  is 
well  to  die  here  washed  and  shrived  in  the  sacred  waters 
that  must  bear  one's  worn-out  body  to  rest  in  the  sea. 
And  for  the  maimed  there  is  at  least  the  consolation  of 
pity  from  those  whom  religion  makes  merciful.  Here 
and  there  sat  a  wild-eyed  fakir,  a  living  skeleton  marked 
with  ash.  Here  and  there  a  Brahmin  wearing  the  white 
cord  of  the  twice-born  moved  through  the  throng,  hold- 
ing out  a  hand  to  clear  a  space  before  him  lest  he  should 
be  contaminated  by  some  mortal  made  of  baser  clay. 
Everywhere  there  were  the  blind,  the  halt,  and  the  lepers 
— above  all,  the  lepers.  Through  it  all  the  sacred  cows 
wandered  serenely,  those  ubiquitous  and  privileged 
members  of  every  Indian  throng. 

"Won't  it  seem  strange,"  remarked  Beatrice,  "not  to 
see  a  cow  wandering  down  Fifth  Avenue?" 

But  all  was  glorified  by  the  shimmer  of  white  sun- 
shine, the  gleam  of  marigolds,  the  circus-like  gaiety, 
and  the  wail  of  wild  music  afar  off. 

So  we  descended  the  steps  to  the  river  and  pushed 
out  into  the  water  on  a  raft.  Then  the  landscape  blazed ! 
Before  us  rose  the  enormous  piles  of  the  temples,  temple 
on  temple,  palace  on  palace,  rampart  on  rampart — the 
architectural  accumulation  of  hundreds  and  hundreds 
of  years,  blazing  and  twinkling  and  shining.  From 
among  them  descended  steps  to  the  water,  wide  steps 
and  narrow  steps,  with  balconies  and  pavilions  inter- 
posed; and  all  these  were  thronged  with  vast  crowds  gay 
as  a  rainbow,  from  the  distance  coloured  like  the  blaze 
of  a  sunset.  For  all  the  wealth  and  the  glory,  the  hid- 


334  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

den  colour  and  light  of  India,  had  come  forth  to  walk 
side  by  side  with  the  naked  fakir  and  leprous  pilgrim 
down  into  the  cleansing  flood.  The  river  was  full  of 
heads ;  yet  still  the  throngs  poured  in.  Every  one  wore 
his  gayest  dress — and  there  is  no  brilliance  of  colour  in 
all  the  world  like  that  of  India  in  full  regalia.  Purple 
and  orange,  cerise  and  crimson,  green  and  turquoise 
blue,  the  pilgrim  crowds  bloomed  in  the  landscape. 
Gorgeous  ladies  laid  aside  chiffon  draperies  of  parrot 
green  and  mauve  and  scarlet,  and  stepped  down  in  their 
silken  chemises.  Special  pavilions  for  rajahs  and  rich 
Brahmins  poured  forth  the  beauty  and  glory  of  all  queen- 
liness  and  wealth.  Yet  the  poorest  stepped  in  with  as 
proud  a  sense  of  proprietorship,  and  the  little  children 
rode  the  bright  waters  safe  in  the  arms  of  their  parents. 
One  old,  old  man  was  bathing  a  naked  baby  who  kicked 
the  sacred  waters  riotously  with  his  fat  little  feet  and 
sucked  in  the  trickles  of  water  that  travelled  down  over 
his  nose  from  his  wet  curls.  Everywhere,  too,  the  brass 
was  sparkling,  for  each  pilgrim  carried  a  bowl  in  which 
to  bear  away  the  holy  water,  polished  to  catch  the  sun- 
light. Each  bowl  blazed  in  the  landscape  in  a  little 
point  of  flame. 

But  there  were  greater  and  brighter  flames  too — red 
fires  tended  by  naked  men — and  the  smell  of  burning 
human  flesh  came  to  us  on  the  breeze.  We  drew  up  to 
one  of  these  fires.  It  was  a  funeral  pyre.  The  bodies 
of  the  dead,  draped  and  fastened  to  biers,  sometimes  tied 
with  garlands  of  flowers,  lay  all  about,  awaiting  their 
place  in  the  flames.  Meanwhile  the  men  tended  the 
fires,  turning  over  the  bodies  till  they  blazed  more 
brightly  and  with  a  sharper  odour.  Others  were  dredg- 
ing the  river,  for,  when  the  ashes  of  the  dead  are  thrown 


THE  LOTUS  OP  THE  WORLD  335 

into  the  water,  coins  and  jewelry  are  sometimes  among 
them,  and  it  is  profitable  to  search  out  and  find  these 
spoils  of  death.  One  man  boarded  our  raft  with  the 
plunder  he  had  collected,  a  pile  of  odd  bits  of  silver, 
with  cinders  still  clinging  to  it.  He  had  been  lucky,  he 
said ;  for  only  yesterday  the  beloved  bride  of  a  rich  man 
had  been  burned  there,  and  all  her  body  was  hung  with 
silver.  When  he  learned  this,  he  kept  it  a  secret  from 
the  others,  and  robbed  the  ashes  before  any  one  else 
knew.  So  saying,  he  hopped  over  into  his  own  boat  and 
went  gloating  away  over  the  spoils  of  that  dead  love. 

It  was  all  a  strange  and  gorgeous  sight — yet  very, 
very  sad.  I  looked  back  on  those  thousands  and  thou- 
sands of  men.  What  long  journeys  they  had  come  to 
wash  away  their  sins !  How  all  their  money  and  strength 
and  the  hopes  of  their  lives  centred  in  that  morning  bath 
in  the  sunshine  and  that  brazen  bowl  full  of  bright 
water;  and  this  passion  of  religious  faith,  this  haunting 
and  driving  sense  of  uncleanliness  in  the  sight  of  invis- 
ible judging  eyes  which  men  have  felt  in  all  ages  and 
climes,  seemed  pathetic  to  me,  and  full  of  mystery. 
Then  I  looked  out  on  the  broad,  cool  floods  of  the  river. 
How  many  ashes  of  men  had  mingled  with  its  purity! 
How  many  dead  had  gone  down  to  the  sea  in  its  arms ! 
How  heavy  it  was  with  the  sins  and  the  sorrows  of  men 
who  had  striven  to  wash  their  very  souls  in  its  depths ! 
It  looked  so  broad  and  clean  and  strong — clean  with  the 
cleanness  of  the  snowy  heights  where  its  myriad  streams 
were  born.  So  strange  a  river  it  seemed — born  on  the 
mountain  tops,  going  so  long  and  so  majestic  a  journey 
to  the  sea,  fertilizing  the  fields  of  the  land  on  its  prog- 
ress, nourishing  its  people  in  life,  and  receiving  into 
itself  their  sufferings  and  their  sins,  and  taking  them  at 


336 

last  out  of  the  dust  and  flame  of  life  into  its  own  ever- 
lasting coolness  and  peace.  What  river  in  all  the  world 
can  touch  it  in  majesty — this  holy  mother  Ganges? 

I  saw  it  again  in  the  twilight.  A  rosy  moon  hung 
over  the  empty  sands  to  the  east,  flushing  the  pearly 
smoke  that  veiled  the  river.  To  the  west,  silhouetted 
against  the  last  gleam  of  daylight,  rose  the  temples,  pile 
on  pile,  blooming  now  with  a  thousand  lights.  On  all 
the  steps  were  little  bowls  of  oil,  each  with  a  floating 
wick ;  and  robed  figures  moved  among  them,  ghostly  sil- 
houettes among  unstable  stars.  Above  there  were  glow- 
ing windows,  and  here  and  there  a  veiled  woman  look- 
ing forth.  In  one  place  lanterns  were  hung  from  tall, 
bending  poles  that  were  like  a  garden  of  nodding  blos- 
soms. And  everywhere  there  flamed  the  unwearied  fires 
of  the  dead. 

As  we  moved  down  the  water  through  all  this  ghostly 
brightness,  Beatrice  asked:  "Which  is  better,  do  you 
think — to  be  buried  in  a  grassy  place  beneath  a  tree,  or 
to  be  burned  and  go  up  in  smoke  among  the  stars?" 

And  as  I  did  not  answer,  she  continued  after  a  pause, 
"If  one  is  buried  in  a  grave,  one  may  come  up  into  the 
sunlight  as  a  violet,  year  after  year,  but  if  one  is  burned, 
one  is  but  a  brief  light,  and  is  then  for  ever  gone.  I 
think  I  will  be  buried  beneath  the  grass  and  become  a 
violet." 

As  the  darkness  grew  deeper,  all  the  waters  were 
lighted  with  moving  stars,  as  men  set  forth  on  them 
bowls  of  burning  oil  that  tossed  for  a  moment  like  little 
boats  and  then  went  out  in  darkness.  The  shore  was  full 
of  figures  who  sat  with  brazen  bowls  wherein  now  and 
then  leaped  the  reflection  of  a  flame.  Sometimes  there 
was  the  splash  of  a  solitary  bather.  Then  there  rose  on 
the  air  a  wailing  strangely  pitched,  unearthly,  speaking 


THE  LOTUS  OF  THE  WORLD  337 

out  of  the  heart  of  the  sombre  night;  and  we  saw  holy 
men  in  the  distance  silhouetted  around  little  fires, 
singing. 

And  so  we  floated  on,  into  a  world  of  dreams  and 
of  terror  that  wore  a  face  of  beauty,  beneath  the  dome 
of  the  night.  And  the  strangeness  and  the  splendour  of 
it  was  with  us  even  next  morning  when  we  turned  our 
faces  out  into  the  prosaic  dust  of  the  day,  bound  for 
other  cities  and  adventures  more  homely  and  more 
human. 


CHAPTEE  XLIII 

MEMORIALS  OF  OLD  BLOODSHED 

"LOOK  at  him !"  said  Beatrice.  "He  looks  like  an  Irish 
politician." 

He  was  a  very  wise-looking  monkey,  sitting  in  a  tree 
over  our  heads  and  industriously  engaged  in  shaking 
the  dust  of  Benares  down  upon  us,  apparently  in  honour 
of  our  departure.  A  host  of  his  brethren  came  chatter- 
ing forth  and  escorted  us  some  distance  on  our  way ;  and 
the  last  we  saw  of  the  city  of  the  gods  was  this  company 
of  unregenerate  little  creatures,  with  their  cynical,  age- 
old  faces  and  their  pathetic  parodies  of  human  ways. 

So  Beatrice  and  I  rode  forth  and  forgot  for  a  time  the 
gods.  We  had  struck  a  new  trail,  the  trail  of  the  white 
man  in  India,  too  often  a  tragic  and  blood-stained  way; 
and  on  that  we  were  to  travel  till  we  came  into  the 
palatial  cities  of  the  north. 

But  first  we  turned  aside  to  make  one  last  obeisance 
to  Oriental  divinity  at  Sarnath.  Sarnath  is  the  older 
site  of  Benares,  where  Buddha  taught  after  he  had  re- 
ceived enlightenment  at  Buddha  Gaya.  It  is  now  full 
of  the  great  ruins  of  what  was  once  one  of  the  most  spa- 
cious and  cultivated  monasteries  of  the  East,  All  round, 
the  empty  land  lies  golden  in  the  amber  light  of  the 
day;  and  within  its  ruined  walls  there  lingers  some- 
thing a  little  foreign  to  the  spirit  of  India — some  mem- 
ory of  those  Greek  artists  who  seemed  to  have  followed 
in  the  wake  of  Alexander  the  Great  long  ago,  and  found 
in  the  pure  and  simple  spirit  of  Buddhism  something 

338 


MEMORIALS  OF  OLD  BLOODSHED        339 

congenial  with  their  own  tradition.  It  was  strange  to 
wander  here,  to  mark  out  the  almost  obliterated  bound- 
aries of  the  monastery,  stumbling  now  over  a  bit  of 
lotus  in  stone,  incomparably  delicate,  now  over  a  col- 
umn, now  over  a  wall  whence  some  graven  story  had 
been  broken  away.  We  wandered  about  the  monks  who 
had  lived  here  long  ago,  about  the  dead  hands  whose 
patience  had  carved  so  delicately,  interpreting  in  Greek 
beauty  the  story  of  Buddha.  Whence  came  it,  this 
Greek  loveliness?  Was  it  the  memory  of  the  Parthenon, 
persisting  here  centuries  after  the  original  stood  ruined 
among  the  wrecks  of  Greece?  Centuries  after  the  ruf- 
fians who  came  with  Alexander  were  safely  consigned  to 
dust? 

The  central  monument,  a  vast  conical  tower,  rose 
straight  into  the  blue  sky,  carved  with  great  lotuses. 
The  flower  seemed  to  blossom  in  the  stone  in  all  its  living 
grace,  lovingly  interpreted  as  one  might  catch  and  inter- 
pret the  gestures  of  a  beautiful  woman,  in  endless  poses 
and  attitudes  of  beauty. 

We  entered  the  museum  and  wandered  for  a  while 
among  Buddhas  standing  and  sitting.  Stiff  and  archaic 
in  body,  they  were  beautiful  in  countenance,  like  ones 
who  had  "attained  to  look  on  the  beginning  of  peace." 
Then  we  passed  on,  carrying  with  us  like  a  benediction 
on  our  new  adventures  the  memory  of  a  Buddha  with  a 
calm  Greek  face. 

Plunging  for  some  hours  through  dust  and  light,  we 
came  to  Allahabad,  a  flat  and  dingy  city.  Somewhere  I 
read  a  poem  about  a  boy  who  used  to  dream  romantically 
of  being  a  "prince  in  Allahabad."  The  poet  must  have 
picked  out  this  site  for  a  palace  strictly  on  the  sound  of 
the  name,  for  it  has  nothing  to  contribute  to  royal  splen- 
dour now  except  dust  and  poverty.  But  here  again 


340  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

we  found  the  hand  of  the  white  man  not  in  such  ghostly 
memories  of  grace  as  people  Sarnath  but  in  a  homely 
bit  of  Nebraska  flourishing  in  a  great  pomp  of  waving 
grain  and  all  the  efficiency  of  fertilizers  and  silos ! 

For  a  missionary  with  a  wife  who  is  a  niece  of  Buf- 
falo Bill  had  settled  here,  and  had  wisely  decided  that 
what  ailed  India  was  that  it  didn't  know  how  it  ought  to 
be  farmed.  They  had  taken  possession  of  a  stretch  of 
semi-desert  country,  and  by  treating  it  as  one  might 
treat  the  soil  of  Nebraska,  had  produced  for  the  edifica- 
tion of  the  whole  province  a  first-class  imitation  of  a 
great  Western  farm.  Fresh  and  homelike  they  seemed 
to  us,  those  bright  harvest  fields,  and  the  sleek,  hand- 
some stock  contentedly  basking  in  the  shadow  of  a  model 
barn.  I  had  not  realized  till  then  how  unnecessary 
starvation  was  in  India,  nor  how  unnatural  were  those 
wastes  of  sun-baked,  unblossoming  earth. 

The  farm  included  a  leper  mission.  Here,  too,  the 
healthy  and  efficient  love  of  the  good  brown  earth  which 
these  Westerners  had  brought  had  exerted  a  medicinal 
influence.  The  station  had  been  started  long  ago  by  a 
Christian  girl  who  found  herself  a  leper,  and  had  res- 
cued herself  at  last  from  the  despair  of  her  living  death 
by  making  more  happy  the  lot  of  others  like  herself. 
The  missionary  had  then  added  his  gospel  of  the  soil  to 
her  gospel  of  self-forgetting.  The  lepers  were  housed 
in  cottages  beneath  the  shade  of  trees,  and  given  all  the 
responsibility  of  individual  householders.  Before  each 
cottage  was  a  little  garden  where  those  who  still  had  the 
use  of  their  limbs  might  work.  I  saw  one  man  digging 
with  a  trowel  tied  to  a  stump  of  a  hand  that  was  almost 
eaten  away.  He  stopped  and  chatted  with  us  quite 
cheerfully.  An  old  woman,  obviously  in  pain,  twisted 
and  knotted  with  disease,  had  nevertheless  hobbled 


>4t-*-        ^ 


Courtesy  Foreign  Missions  Library,  15(5  Fifth  Ave.,  X.  Y. 


Fresh  and  home-like  they  seemed  to  us,  those  bright 
harvest  fields 


Courtesy  Foreign  Missions  Library,  150  Fifth  Ave.,  N.  Y. 


This  agricultural  efficiency  was  to  us  the  most  interesting  thing 
about  Allahabad 


MEMORIALS  OF  OLD  BLOODSHED        341 

out  to  a  station  under  a  tree  where  she  could  criticize 
the  agricultural  efforts  of  her  neighbours.  The  leper 
colony  was  clean  and  fresh  and  full  of  green  growing 
things,  and  everywhere  there  was  a  stir  of  enterprise. 
And  when  the  missionary  noticed  a  cloud  of  flies,  he 
demonstrated  the  value  of  science  in  charity  by  remark- 
ing to  his  Indian  attendant : 

"Too  many  flies  here.  Find  their  breeding-place  and 
remove  it." 

This  agricultural  efficiency  was  to  us  by  far  the  most 
interesting  thing  about  Allahabad,  but  we  showed  our 
appreciation  of  its  site  by  standing  where  the  Jumna 
and  the  Ganges  join,  a  holy  union  of  two  storied  and 
sacred  rivers.  The  waters  were  full  of  the  bodies  of 
those  who  had  died  of  influenza,  and  had  been  flung  in 
unburned  and  uncleansed,  because  during  those  terrible 
days  there  were  no  facilities  in  India  for  handling  the 
great  influx  of  the  dead.  As  they  floated  down  with 
faces  upturned  to  the  staring  sky,  there  was  a  splash, 
a  darting  of  some  hidden  life,  and  a  ripple  that  told  that 
another  piece  of  mortal  clay  had  gone  to  its  last  resting 
place  in  the  stomach  of  a  crocodile.  And  the  little  white 
children  liked  to  scamper  down  to  stand  on  the  red 
bridge  and  watch  this  ghastly  drama!  As  each  body 
disappeared,  they  would  cry:  "Hi,  there  goes  another 
one."  Their  sympathy  was  wholly  with  the  crocodiles. 

Leaving  Allahabad  at  noon,  we  paused  for  two  hours 
toward  sunset  in  Cawnpore,  a  beautiful  little  city  full 
of  British  bungalows  and  British  lawns  ami  the  most 
bloody  memories  of  British  history  in  India.  For  here 
in  the  rebellion  of  1857  a  band  of  two  hundred  English 
soldiers  defended  a  great  company  of  English  women 
and  children  against  an  attacking  force  of  three  thou- 
sand rebel  sepoys,  well  trained,  well  armed,  and  well 


342  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

provisioned.  Through  the  quiet  English  lawns  that  now 
cover  that  scene  of  old  torture  we  traced  the  story — the 
mounting  total  of  the  dead  day  by  day ;  the  well  in  which 
the  bodies  of  these  cut  down  were  thrown;  the  spot  on 
the  river-bank  where  the  rest  embarked  under  safe-con- 
duct of  the  enemy,  only  to  be  attacked  and  to  perish 
amid  the  flames  of  their  own  boats  in  mid-water; 
the  house  in  which  a  remnant  of  one  hundred  and  twen- 
ty-five whom  the  enemy  chose  to  keep  alive  for  a  time 
were  lodged  to  die  of  slow  disease;  and  the  spot  where 
those  who  survived  even  this  last  trial  were  finally  taken 
out  and  shot.  It  was  all  so  quiet  now — those  old  scars 
of  shot  covered  with  healing  grass  and  fresh  verdure, 
and  caressed  by  the  light  and  quiet  shadows  of  the  late 
afternoon ;  and  around  the  altar  of  the  memorial  church, 
built  in  honour  of  those  sufferers,  the  winged  angels, 
with  glowing  halos  and  shining  faces,  kept  guard  in  the 
incensed  dusk  of  evening  over  the  names  and  tablets  of 
the  unforgotten  dead. 

One  more  dash  through  the  dark,  and  we  emerged  in 
a  wider  land  of  vast  spaces  and  an  infinite  glory  of  light. 
This  was  the  Mohammedan  country,  peopled  with  the 
memories  of  fierce  kings  and  conquests,  and  palaces  still 
fresh  with  their  splendour.  In  the  midst  of  the  bright 
emptiness  sits  Lucknow,  a  queen  of  cities.  She  is  only 
an  imitation  of  a  queen,  perhaps,  for  all  her  jewels 
are  paste,  and  the  real  sovereignty  of  this  land  lies  be- 
yond in  Delhi  and  Agra;  but  she  bears  herself  with 
majesty  none  the  less. 

Everything  in  Lucknow  was  on  a  grand  scale — end- 
less avenues,  parks  that  seemed  wide  as  prairies,  build- 
ings whose  roofs  alone  could  span  the  average  Oriental 
town,  and,  shining  in  white  grandeur  of  mosque  and 
minaret,  the  great  procession  of  the  tombs  of  the  kings 


MEMORIALS  OF  OLD  BLOODSHED       343 

of  Oudh.  We  revelled  in  the  bigness  and  the  cleanliness, 
so  different  from  the  ill-smelling  clutter  of  many  an 
Eastern  city. 

We  soon  came  to  a  venerable  place,  like  some  forgot- 
ten corner  of  an  English  estate.  The  grass  was  still 
green,  though  elsewhere  the  world  was  dust;  and  there 
were  depths  of  coolness  and  shade  between  the  trees, 
and  the  ruins  of  walls  and  forts  and  towers,  half  over- 
grown with  moss  and  the  purple  light  of  bougainvillea. 
Greybeard  English  soldiers  in  khaki  and  helmets  tot- 
tered to  and  fro  among  the  shadows  of  these  ruins. 
Over  it  all  there  was  the  peace,  the  dignity  of  old  age. 

This  was  the  Residency.  Like  Cawnpore  it  was  the 
scene  of  one  of  the  most  terrible  dramatic  episodes  in 
the  rebellion  of  1857,  when  the  native  troops  of  the  Brit- 
ish in  this  northern  country  turned  against  their  masters 
and  used  upon  them  the  training  and  the  supplies  they 
had  received  at  their  hands.  It  had  been  something  of  a 
British  manor  once,  well  walled  and  fortified.  Here  the 
English  governor  of  the  land  had  dwelt,  after  the  King- 
dom of  Oudh,  of  which  Lucknow  was  the  capital,  had 
been  transferred  from  the  rule  of  its  own  degenerate 
kings  to  that  of  the  British.  Here  the  women  and  chil- 
dren had  been  gathered  and,  under  the  defence  of  a 
handful  of  Englishmen,  had  withstood  attack  from  the 
first  of  July  till  the  twenty-fifth  of  September.  Again 
and  again  the  hordes  of  the  enemy  fell  back. 

Flying  and  foiled  at  the  last  by  the  handful  they  could 

not  subdue, 
And  ever  upon  the  topmost  roof  the  banner  of  England 

blew. 

The  topmost  roof  still  carries  the  banner  of  England 
over  which  Tennyson  exulted ;  but  this  building  is  ruined 


344  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

now,  a  clinging  place  for  vines  and  flowers,  and  a  nest 
for  a  hundred  birds. 

Soberly  we  wandered  in  the  quiet  shadows,  retracing 
the  steps  of  those  bloody  days.  The  greybeard  soldiers 
came  out  and  talked  to  us,  for  they  were  veterans  of  the 
famous  fight,  ready  to  guide  us  like  ghosts  among  the 
memorials  of  forgotten  bloodshed.  We  saw  the  cellar 
where  the  women  and  children  huddled  day  after  day 
while  the  world  shook  with  gunfire  above  them,  and 
news  of  the  dead  and  the  dying  was  all  that  punctuated 
the  dreary  hours.  And  we  saw  the  corner  where  Jessie 
had  heard  the  sound  of  bagpipes  in  her  dreams — bag- 
pipes that  were  later  to  come  to  the  rescue  when  Have- 
lock  and  his  Highlanders,  riding  on  camels,  past  mosque 
and  palace  whose  resistance  melted  like  snow  before 
them,  came  into  Lucknow  on  that  September  day.  We 
saw,  too,  the  grave  of  Sir  Henry  Lawrence,  who  was 
killed  in  the  defence  of  his  people,  with  its  brief  and 
noble  epitaph  that  he  himself  devised : 

Here  lies  Henry  Lawrence,  who  tried  to  do  his  duty. 

Afterward  we  went  out  to  the  edge  of  the  city,  through 
infinite  spaces  of  lawn  and  avenue,  and  followed  the 
famous  march  of  Havelock,  past  plaster  mosques  em- 
broidered in  flourishes  of  bright  blue  paint,  and  yellow 
palaces  now  crumbling  into  dust. 

We  stopped,  too,  among  the  palaces  where  the  seven 
hundred  and  more  wives  of  the  kings  of  Oudh  had  lived. 
They  were  not  real  palaces,  for  the  kings  of  Oudh  were 
but  tributary  monarchs  and  their  taste  in  building  was 
decidedly  cheap.  So  these  were  just  low  structures 
around  a  central  square.  It  was  interesting  to  medi- 
tate on  the  lot  of  a  wife  who  was  one  in  seven  hundred. 


MEMORIALS  OF  OLD  BLOODSHED       345 

Beatrice  and  I  did  mental  arithmetic  on  the  subject  till 
our  heads  spun  round.  If  every  wife  could  see  her  hus- 
band one  day  in  turn,  she  would  see  him  once  in  every 
two  years.  We  speculated  on  an  array  of  seven  hundred 
spring  bonnets,  and  the  complications  of  seven  hundred 
families  of  children,  and  seven  hundred  curtain-lectures, 
and  seven  hundred  wives  going  through  the  pockets  of 
one  husband.  Forgiving  one's  brother  seventy  times 
seven  seemed  an  easy  matter  compared  with  multiplying 
domestic  difficulties  by  seven  hundred.  Afterward,  how- 
ever, when  we  saw  the  picture  of  the  last  king  of  Oudh, 
we  were  rather  inclined  to  congratulate  the  ladies  on 
being  seven  hundred.  There  is  safety  in  numbers,  and 
every  one  of  them  must  have  rejoiced  that  she  did  not 
have  to  endure  him  all  alone.  One  seven  hundredth  of 
such  a  creature  seemed  all  that  any  mortal  wife  could 
stand. 

The  study  of  the  portrait  of  this  outrageous  king  was 
the  climax  of  our  visit  to  the  tombs  of  his  ancestors  in 
the  Mohammedan  portion  of  the  city.  It  was  a  strange 
world,  that  place  of  tombs — vast,  blatant,  unsubstantial. 
One  after  another  they  rose,  those  mighty  domes  and 
minarets  blazing  white  against  the  blazing  blue,  with 
wildernesses  of  scalloped  arch,  and  waters  that  caught 
and  doubled  every  curve  and  flash  of  whiteness.  They 
were  all  of  painted  plaster,  decorated  in  outrageous 
whorls  of  black  and  blue  paint,  and  filled  with  chan- 
deliers and  bangles  and  vases  of  cheapest  coloured  glass. 
It  was  a  kind  of  paste  splendour,  yet  lacking  not  in 
grandeur  of  conception.  For  they  were  but  imitation 
kings,  those  kings  of  Oudh,  and  well  deserved  to  sleep  in 
imitation  splendour. 

Beneath  one  domed  roof  we  found  a  collection  of  their 
portraits,  and  a  strange  study  in  degeneracy  it  was.  It 


346  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

was  rather  like  a  line  of  portraits  in  a  modern  pluto- 
cratic family,  for  kings  in  the  old  days  corresponded 
very  nearly  to  capitalists  in  ours.  The  first  was  a  rather 
fine  old  fellow,  a  Persian  adventurer  who  had  carved 
out  a  kingdom  for  himself,  and  looked  well  fitted  for 
the  task.  He  had  a  hooked  nose  and  fierce  eyes  that 
glared  beneath  a  jewelled  turban,  and  the  limbs  beneath 
his  silken  robes  were  those  of  a  man  who  knew  hard  rid- 
ing and  rough  days.  A  dauntless  old  man,  proud  and 
able,  and  bigoted  no  doubt,  yet  instinct  with  life,  all  ten- 
sion, will,  and  power,  just  the  kind  that  wrests  kingdoms 
and  fortunes  from  the  world  for  a  degenerate  line  of 
sons  to  waste.  His  first  three  successors  were  not  so 
bad.  Perhaps  they  could  not  win  a  kingdom,  but  they 
looked  like  men  who  could  hold  one.  They  had  some- 
thing of  the  stamp  of  his  energy,  and  a  Moorish  and 
Saracenic  pride  of  royalty ;  men  who  could  wear  a  crown 
and  wield  a  sword  with  equal  dignity. 

Then  the  degeneracy  began.  Fat  began  to  take  the 
place  of  muscle,  and  a  softness  of  mouth  and  chin  and  a 
languor  of  eye  replaced  the  tenseness  of  face  and  fierce- 
ness of  glance.  They  were  galvanized  into  a  kind  of 
passive  kingliness  when  the  British  government  invested 
them  with  golden  crowns  and  ermine,  only  to  be  suc- 
ceeded by  a  worse  degeneracy.  The  face  of  the  last  king, 
the  husband  of  the  seven  hundred,  was  curtained  for 
very  shame.  We  persuaded  our  guide  to  draw  it  aside. 
The  thing  that  was  revealed,  though  masculine,  was 
really  the  face  and  form  of  a  courtesan,  fat  and  white. 
The  plump,  bejewelled  hands,  small  and  soft  as  a 
woman's,  pointed  to  a  slit  in  his  vest  which  he  had  had 
cut  to  show  the  whiteness  of  his  skin,  and  above  it  his 
fat,  smooth  face,  with  its  curving  red  lips,  smirked  with 
feeble  vanity. 


MEMORIALS  OF  OLD  BLOODSHED        347 

My  last  glimpse  of  Lucknow  was  at  evening  time  from 
the  iron  bridge.  The  queenly  city  lay  beneath  the  sunset, 
every  mosque  and  minaret  silhouetted  grey  against  the 
light,  like  shadow  against  flame.  Tomb  and  mosque  and 
minaret,  they  seemed  to  hang  and  hover  in  the  heavens 
without  body  or  earthly  foundation — mosque  upon 
mosque  and  minaret  upon  minaret ;  and  the  waters  that 
reflected  them  made  of  them  only  fairy  pictures  among 
the  clouds.  Quivering  over  the  city  hung  the  evening 
smoke  of  India,  and  the  dull  red  fires  of  cow-dung  shone 
forth,  and  the  crows  flew  cawing  into  the  night.  So  we 
returned  home,  but  I  was  startled  by  a  strange  ghost,  a 
monkey  perched  in  a  tree  above  me,  eyeing  me  solemnly 
in  the  dusk,  like  a  little  old  man. 


CHAPTER  XLIV 

THE  LAND  OF  THE  GREAT  MOGUL 

THE  jewels  were  no  longer  paste  and  the  world  grew 
even  wider.  We  had  come  into  Delhi,  the  real  city  of 
kings,  where  palace  has  grown  on  palace,  through  cen- 
turies of  Indian  history.  The  clutter,  the  small  scale 
and  ephemeral  character  of  tropical  royalty,  had  wholly 
vanished.  This  was  a  vast  land,  full  of  vast  spaces, 
once  ruled  by  able  kings  from  the  hills  who  built  forts 
like  mountains,  and  palaces  beneath  the  marble  arches 
of  which  even  an  emperor  would  feel  himself  but  a  lit- 
tle thing. 

They  stretch  for  miles  on  the  plains,  ruins  where  king- 
dom has  succeeded  kingdom,  and  palace  has  followed 
palace,  and  temple  has  been  built  on  temple  in  response 
to  conquering  hordes  from  the  north.  Some  of  them  are 
old  and  ruined ;  only  the  gipsies  inhabit  them  now,  and 
the  green  parrot  screams  from  the  broken  towers;  but 
some  of  them  are  still  fresh,  as  if  their  splendour  was  a 
thing  of  yesterday,  and  the  clink  of  some  queenly  anklet 
might  still  sound  across  the  marble  floors. 

Our  guide  to  all  these  splendours  should  no  doubt  have 
been  some  lovely  ghost.  But  luck  sent  us  instead  a 
cheerful  individual  from  Missouri — of  whom  more  anon. 
We  did  not  meet  him  till  afternoon. 

The  morning  we  spent  in  the  courts  of  the  great 
mosque  of  Shahjahan.  It  is  built  solidly,  like  a  fort,  of 
red  sandstone  inlaid  with  black  and  white  marble.  For 

348 


THE  LAND  OF  THE  GEEAT  MOGUL   349 

an  hour  we  wandered  among  its  solemn  white  corridors 
and  domes,  and  then  among  the  upper  galleries  where 
the  queenly  ladies  used  to  sit  behind  curtains  that  pro- 
tected them  from  the  gaze  of  men.  Did  they  flirt  a  little, 
I  wonder?  Did  ever  a  smile  never  shine  through  the 
enveloping  folds?  Were  there  no  fluttering  hearts 
among  the  veils,  no  ripple  of  soft  silks  which  told  some 
lover  below  of  her  who  worshipped  there  in  concealment, 
no  clink  of  ornaments  that  spoke  a  language  all  their 
own?  Were  the  thoughts  of  men  below  always  on  holy 
matters?  Or  did  they,  on  their  ascent  to  heaven,  stop 
sometimes  at  the  galleries  above,  behind  which  there  was 
perfume,  and  the  casual  music  of  bracelets,  and  a  mys- 
tery of  breathing  life? 

We  climbed  one  of  the  minarets  and  saw  the  city 
spread  out  before  us.  Our  guide  filled  his  arms 
with  the  frightened  doves  who  had  got  caught  in  the 
towers,  and  set  them  free  from  the  top  of  the  mina- 
rets. He  was  a  tall  turbaned  priest  who  looked  as  if 
he  should  have  been  on  a  Sunday-school  card.  After  ex- 
tracting money  from  us  for  prayers  and  finding  us  prof- 
itable, he  returned  with  four  other  big,  handsome  rascals 
who  stood  in  a  row  before  us,  looking  for  all  the  world 
like  a  committee  of  the  sons  of  Jacob,  and  said  that  they 
too  would  pray  for  us — for  a  consideration. 

By  this  time  we  had  grown  wary.  Then  one  of  them 
bethought  himself  of  other  temple  wares.  He  led  us  to  a 
little  shrine  where  another  handsome  rascal  produced  a 
copy  of  the  Koran  written,  so  he  averred,  by  the  sacred 
hand  of  Mohammed  himself,  together  with  Mohammed's 
shoes  preserved  in  jasmine  flowers,  and  a  stiff  red  bristle 
which,  he  said,  once  grew  in  Mohammed's  beard.  This, 
avowed  the  priest,  kow-towing  to  it  reverently,  was 
"beautiful."  He  asked  us  to  pay  two  rupees  for  the 


350  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

vision  of  such  beauty.  We  shouldn't  have  another  such 
chance,  he  said,  this  side  of  Mecca. 

When  we  returned  to  the  hotel,  the  hostess,  to  whose 
special  ministrations  Herbert  had  consigned  us,  bustled 
out  and,  with  an  air  of  romantic  importance,  said  that  a 
gentleman  wished  to  meet  us.  He  was  an  American 
from  Missouri,  and  wondered  whether  we  would  let  him 
take  us  out  that  afternoon  in  his  automobile  to  see  the 
palaces.  Beatrice  and  I  briefly  deliberated  and  said  we 
would  meet  him. 

A  few  minutes  later  a  tall  slim  youth,  with  an  easy, 
springy  figure,  came  in  and,  with  a  few  preliminaries, 
asked,  in  a  middle  western  voice  and  accent:  "Would 
you  really  like  Jimmy  to  take  you  rubbernecking  this 
afternoon?" 

"Jimmy,"  it  seems,  was  his  large  automobile,  some- 
what the  worse  for  wear  and  still  carrying  a  miscel- 
laneous collection  of  the  dust  of  India.  He  and  Jimmy 
had  just  come  in,  he  explained,  intending  to  stop  for 
lunch  and  go  on.  He  was  on  his  way  to  Lahore  to  sell 
sewing  machines.  But,  discovering  our  names  on  the 
register,  he  had  gone  to  the  hostess  and  asked  whether 
we  were  sufficiently  young,  pretty,  and  good-natured  to 
stay  over  for,  and  then  had  changed  his  plans  and  de- 
cided to  show  us  palaces — all  in  the  course  of  an  hour 
before  the  lunch  which  he  now  proposed  to  eat  with  us. 
All  this  he  told  us  simply  and  easily,  without  the  slight- 
est trace  of  impudence,  with  even  some  of  that  shyness 
that  an  American  of  this  sort  so  often  hides  beneath  his 
self-possession. 

There  was  a  flash  of  telegraphic  intuition  between 
Beatrice  and  me,  and  then  with  that  pretty  assumption 
of  all  the  prerogatives  of  Mrs.  which,  though  younger 


THE  LAND  OF  THE  GREAT  MOGUL   351 

than  I,  she  always  liked  to  flourish  over  me  on  such  occa- 
sions, she  graciously  accepted  his  arrangement. 

During  lunch  our  Yankee  asked  suddenly:  "Do  you 
really  care  about  these  old  guys?" 

"You  mean  those  Mohammedan  emperors?"  asked 
Beatrice.  "They  make  the  poor  little  kings  of  Europe 
look  quite  like  the  proletariat,  don't  they?" 

He  looked  a  bit  dazed  by  this  statement,  and  an- 
swered almost  bashfully :  "Oh,  I  really  don't  know  any- 
thing about  the  old  boys — but  these  are  some  palaces, 
believe  me — just  like  I  read  about  in  The  Arabian 
Nights  when  I  was  a  kid.  But  the  other  fellows  always 
guy  me  for  caring  about  this  sort  of  thing  in  India.  You 
know,  really,  I  stop  to  look  at  a  palace  every  time  I  get  a 
chance,"  he  ended  naively,  as  if  he  were  half  ashamed 
of  the  weakness. 

Then  settling  down  to  a  lesson  in  history,  he  asked: 
"Tell  me,  did  the  fellow  who  built  the  palaces  here  build 
those  at  Agra? — I  have  just  come  from  there.  Gee,  they 
have  some  beauties  there,  and  the  Taj  Mahal — like  a 
white  lily  in  stone!" 

"The  man  who  built  the  Taj  Mahal  also  built  all  the 
palaces  here,"  said  Beatrice.  "But  some  of  the  palaces 
of  Agra  were  the  work  of  his  grandfather,  Akbar." 

"And  what,"  asked  our  Yankee,  "is  the  difference  be- 
tween Akbar  and  Shahjahan?" 

Beatrice  explained  that  famous  line  of  emperors,  be- 
ginning with  Tamerlane  whose  name  was  a  fable  in  Eu- 
rope, and  the  symbol  even  to  the  English  Marlowe  of  all- 
conquering  pride.  She  told  how  Akbar  had  built  up  one 
of  the  greatest  of  Asian  empires,  and  had  united  under 
his  rule  more  of  India  than  had  been  united  till  Great 
Britain  took  the  country  over  from  his  descendants; 


352  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

how  he  had  been  succeeded  by  Jahanjir,  who  was  re- 
markable mainly  because  he  was  the  husband  of  Nur- 
mahal,  whom  he  had  loved  in  his  youth  and  had  won 
when  she  was  a  widow  of  forty,  though  for  at  least 
twenty  years  after  she  still  bore  the  reputation  of 
matchless  beauty  unequalled  among  the  young  maidens ; 
and  how  Shahjahan  had  followed  and  had  built  up  and 
had  consolidated  the  great  empire  which  he  had 
inherited. 

"To  the  courts  of  Akbar,"  added  Beatrice,  "flocked 
even  great  European  scholars  and  artists,  and  were  wel- 
comed for  their  learning  and  their  genius." 

"Let's  see  now,"  said  our  Yankee,  briefly  recapitulat- 
ing :  "Akbar  was  grandpa — and  he  staked  out  the  claim 
and  was  a  bit  of  a  high-brow,  by  the  way ;  then  there  was 
Nurmahal,  who  was  forty  years  old  and  a  peach;  and 
then  Shahjahan — that's  all  right.  And  now  just  let's 
dangle  along  and  see  the  little  cottages  the  old  boys  used 
to  inhabit  around  here." 

Forthwith  we  set  out.  The  world  was  all  before  us 
in  the  shape  of  wide  yellow  country  where  on  all  sides 
great  domes  and  minarets  and  broken  walls  rose  in  clus- 
ters for  miles  and  miles;  and  here  and  there  a  camel- 
caravan  passed  by  and  eyed  us  with  vague  wonder. 

"I'm  going  to  ask  the  next  camel-driver  I  see  to  let 
me  have  a  ride,"  said  Beatrice  rashly.  A  few  minutes 
later  another  camel  hove  in  sight.  The  Man  from  Mis- 
souri stopped  his  car  in  a  businesslike  way,  flourished  a 
rupee  before  the  camel-driver,  and  the  great  beast 
promptly  plumped  down  beside  the  car,  looking  at 
Beatrice  with  bland,  inquiring  eyes.  Beatrice  gasped. 
The  Man  from  Missouri  said  simply :  "You  said  you  were 
going  to  ride  the  next  camel.  Here  he  is." 


THE  LAND  OF  THE  GREAT  MOGUL   ;',r,;{ 

Beatrice  climbed  on  his  back  at  once  and  disap- 
peared into  the  sky. 

"Will  you  ride,  too?''  asked  the  Man  from  Missouri, 
and  forthwith  another  beast  prostrated  himself. 

Fearfully  I  clambered  upon  that  odd,  warm,  mis- 
shapen lump  of  meek  animal  flesh,  trying  to  find  a  com- 
fortable bump  to  hang  on  to,  and  feeling  positively  bash- 
ful on  such  close  acquaintance  with  a  creature  hitherto 
known  to  me  only  in  circuses.  Suddenly  be  began  to 
rise,  and  I  clung  to  him  in  terror — as  I  went  up,  up,  up 
into  the  heavens,  and  the  Yankee  and  the  automobile 
below  sank  down  into  far-off  diminutive  proportions.  I 
never  in  my  life  imagined  that  a  beast  could  be  so  tall. 
I  sat  far  above  the  shrubby  trees  by  the  wayside,  on  the 
level  with  domes  and  minarets.  Then  he  began  to  move! 
It  was  like  riding  on  a  house  that  was  falling  to  pieces 
beneath  one.  Every  time  he  took  a  step,  his  whole  anat- 
omy seemed  to  cave  in,  and  I  fell  from  one  loose,  dan- 
gerous hollow  to  another  on  his  unstable  back.  There 
was  not  the  cushiony  firmness  of  a  horse's  back  at  all- 
just  an  irregular  mass  of  bones,  loosely  put  together. 
The  ship  of  the  desert — I  should  say  so !  A  shipwreck ! 
And  all  the  time,  there  was  Beatrice  blithely  riding 
away  into  the  blue  sky  like  one  to  the  manner  born,  talk- 
ing a  strange  petting  language  to  the  outrageous  brute. 

Then  the  dusty  earth  seemed  to  shake  beneath  me,  and 
another  camel  came  loping  past,  bearing,  it  seemed,  a 
complete  tent  on  its  back.  As  it  came  opposite  me,  a 
pair  of  wondering  dark  feminine  eyes  looked  forth  out  of 
crimson  shawls  into  mine,  but  the  beast  went  on. 

"Ships  that  pass  in  the  night,"  I  reflected,  "have  noth- 
ing on  the  camel-backs  that  pass  in  the  sky." 

"Are  you  tired?"  shouted  the  Yankee  from  below  after 


354 

two  centuries  had  passed,  and  I  was  still  proceeding 
into  bright  space. 

"Oh,  I  don't  know,"  I  called  down  nonchalantly,  de- 
termined not  to  confess.  "I  suppose  I  might  as  well 
get  down." 

Crash  went  my  ship  into  the  desert — he  was  merely 
kneeling.  And  there  was  I  only  a  few  feet  above  the 
ground,  clinging  to  his  hot,  shaggy  side  as  if  I  really 
loved  him.  I  slid  off,  feeling  myself  barely  safe  from  an 
uncanny  death,  but  with  an  outward  appearance  of  hav- 
ing ridden  camels  all  my  life,  which  I  was  modelling 
strictly  on  the  experienced  behaviour  of  Beatrice.  But, 
oh,  the  blessed  charm  of  that  automobile,  so  near  the  safe 
earth,  so  wide  and  well -cushioned ! 

Passing  many  a  cluster  of  ruins  and  many  beautiful 
dome  and  minaret  and  carved  gateway,  we  came  at  last 
to  a  great  sand-stone  gate  guarded  by  two  monster  ele- 
phants in  stone.  This  led  through  great  walls  to  the 
palaces  of  Shahjahan,  which  still  stand  in  something  of 
their  original  glory.  Dainty  creations  they  were,  built 
for  the  delight  of  ladies — for  such  a  lady  as  the  sweet 
girl  whom  he  loved  with  a  love  amazing  in  the  annals  of 
Oriental  monarchs,  and  whose  name  he  for  ever  en- 
shrined in  the  white  delicacy  of  the  Taj  at  Agra,  loveliest 
of  all  the  monuments  ever  built  to  a  beloved  woman. 

There  were  marble  pavilions  the  columns  of  which 
seemed  to  grow  out  of  lotus  blossoms,  inlaid  with  car- 
nelian  and  bloodstone  and  agate,  every  inch  of  the  wall 
delicately  jewelled  as  a  lady's  bracelet.  They  opened  on 
gardens  which  are  now  dry  and  dusty  but  which  were 
once  sweet  with  roses.  There  fountains  had  once 
flashed  in  marble  basins  inlaid  with  silver  and  filled  at 
night  with  coloured  lights  over  which  the  waters  played 
like  living  and  leaping  jewels.  In  such  a  rose-garden, 


THE  LAND  OF  THE  GREAT  MO(U'L      IK:* 

no  doubt,  Nurmahal  had  met  her  lover  at  last,  and  had 
united  the  late  brilliance  of  her  wonderful  life  with  that 
of  the  weak  man  whose  only  strength  was  that  he 
loved  her. 

In  the  more  intimate  apartments  there  were  rose- 
water  fountains  in  which  the  ladies  long  ago  had  bathed. 
These  palaces  all  looked  out  on  the  river,  whence  in  the 
afternoon  the  breeze  blew  cool  and  fresh.  It  was  the 
quintessence  of  delicate  luxury.  I  had  been  in  many 
Oriental  palaces,  and  this  was  the  first  in  which  a  whole- 
some, active,  and  dainty  lady  of  to-day  might  feel  happily 
at  home.  For  the  luxury  was  founded  on  the  love  of 
simple  and  natural  things,  the  breeze  that  blew  over 
the  waters,  the  sight  of  the  wide-spreading  plains,  the 
perfume  and  freshness  of  roses,  the  splash  and  coolness 
and  cleanliness  of  running  water. 

As  we  wandered  there,  the  sunlight  lay  in  long  streaks 
among  the  marble  columns,  like  the  sunlight  of  after- 
noon among  the  trees  of  the  forest,  and  warmed  the 
marble  into  gold.  And  among  those  long  shadows  in  the 
cool  of  the  afternoon  we  tried  to  call  into  life  the  scenes 
of  old  times — to  set  the  roses  to  blooming,  and  the  water 
to  splashing  over  the  silver  and  the  coloured  lights,  to 
fill  the  empty  halls  with  the  moving  silks  of  women,  the 
clink  of  silver  anklets  and  golden  chains,  the  shine  of 
jewels  in  plaited  hair.  How  sweet  the  evening  breeze 
across  the  waters,  how  pleasant  the  long  shadows  among 
the  roses,  how  the  whole  palace  would  wake  to  gaiety 
after  the  midday  rest!  For  the  great  unscrupulous 
statesman  who  had  built  these  palaces  was  once  a 
lover,  too. 

Then  we  turned  away  to  look  at  the  relics  of  that  old 
life  which  the  British  had  collected  in  the  museum. 
There  were  jewels  and  old  silks  and  swords  too  heavy 


356  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

for  a  modern  hand  to  wield.  There  were  pictures  of 
these  Mohammedan  emperors — a  dark-eyed,  white- 
skinned,  stately  tribe.  Then  suddenly,  in  the  midst  of  it 
all,  I  came  across  a  soldier's  khaki  jacket  and  spy -glass 
— strange  and  humble  relic  of  to-day  in  the  midst  of  old- 
time  splendour.  It  was  symbolic.  This  was  that  before 
which  the  proud  empire  had  crumbled  and  brought  all 
its  jewels  into  the  dust — the  gallantry  of  some  stray  son 
of  England  lost  in  the  wilderness,  straight-hitting,  hard- 
riding,  without  kingliness  or  wealth,  conquering  only 
because  he  must  carry  on  or  die. 

But  as  we  left  the  building,  we  came  across  another 
trace  of  English  conquest,  and  one  that  was  not  wholly 
lovely.  For  a  regiment  of  British  Tommies  now  en- 
camps within  the  royal  walls.  And  as  we  passed  their 
quarters,  we  looked  into  a  poor  little  sitting-room  where 
two  Eurasian  women,  half  Indian,  half  English,  dressed 
in  English  muslin  and  high-heeled  English  shoes,  sat 
sewing  and  gossiping.  And  looking  back  at  the  palaces 
so  lovely  still  in  conquest  and  desertion,  and  then  at 
that  poor  cheap  little  imitation  of  English  homes,  those 
dusky  copies  of  English  wives,  inheriting  the  place  of 
the  empresses,  Beatrice  shivered  and  murmured : 

"Now  these  be  thy  queens,  O  Delhi!" 

The  Man  from  Missouri  was  silent.  His  slangy  com- 
ment had  long  since  sunk  in  speechlessness.  But  as  we 
sped  away,  the  weight  of  that  old  glory  seemed  to  fall 
away  from  us,  and  the  chatter  began.  We  felt  more  at 
home  with  each  other  when  we  came  to  some  ruined 
walls  half  overgrown  with  grass.  We  chased  each  other 
down  a  dusty  corridor  within  a  great  wall,  and  lost  our- 
selves in  the  darkness  of  half  a  dozen  man-made  caves 
and  dungeons,  and  disturbed  gipsies  and  parrots  and 
bats.  When  we  saw  in  the  distance  a  slender  shaft  of 


THE  LAND  OF  THE  GREAT  MOGUL   :r>7 

sandstone  rising  straight  into  the  sunset,  we  turned  our 
automobile  toward  it.  We  did  not  realize  that  it  was  the 
Kutab  Minar,  one  of  the  great  towers  of  the  world. 

As  we  drew  near,  it  seemed  a  vast  thing,  shooting  up 
to  touch  the  very  clouds  and  carved  with  strange  figures 
and  records  of  old  history.  Not  knowing  its  fame  and 
dignity,  we  took  possession  of  it  with  the  naivete-  with 
which  the  old  English  traders  took  possession  of  the 
great  kingdoms  of  India,  and  started  to  climb.  It  was 
deserted  and  dusty  within,  and  outside  the  landscape 
was  darkening.  But  we  went  up  and  up,  issuing  now 
and  then  on  little  curved  balconies  and  delighted  to  see 
the  world  receding  beneath  us,  and  even  domes  and  pal- 
aces falling  away  in  diminishing  perspective,  while  the 
air  so  high  above  the  earth  grew  ever  cooler  and  fresher, 
and  the  casual  sounds  of  the  land  were  lost  in  silence. 
At  last  Beatrice  stopped  breathless  on  a  balcony  and 
said  she  would  go  no  further.  But  I  thought  I  could  not 
rest  till  I  reached  the  very  top.  The  Yankee  hesitated 
a  minute,  and  then  came  on  with  me.  The  walls  were 
now  narrowing  around  us,  and  we  were  coming  out  into 
the  spire  in  which  the  shaft  ended. 

Suddenly  we  issued  into  a  shimmer  of  green  and  sap- 
phire moonlight,  for  the  twilight  had  deepened  sud- 
denly, and  the  crescent  moon  flamed  on  the  forehead  of 
the  night,  and  the  great  stars  seemed  to  look  with  won- 
dering faces  upon  these  two  intruders  into  the  sky.  On 
that  height  it  was  very  still,  and  the  winds  of  evening 
blew  freshly,  with  a  faint,  melancholy  sound. 

"Makes  you  want  a  sweetheart,"  said  the  Man  from 
Missouri,  bashfully. 

"Yes,"  I  answered,  my  own  thoughts  a  thousand  miles 
away. 

Slowly  the  sky  around  us  deepened  into  depths  and 


358  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

depths  of  shimmering  shadow,  and  far  below,  the  lights 
twinkled  forth  in  chains  and  clusters  that  marked  roads 
and  villages  like  jewels  upon  the  breast  of  the  world.  All 
India  seemed  to  lie  before  me.  I  thought  of  all  the  trails 
that  I  might  still  follow  among  its  wonders — among  the 
unseen  and  unsealed  Himalayas,  among  the  jungles  that 
lay  far  to  the  South.  And  of  all  but  one  remained 
to  me,  the  one  that  led  around  the  white  feet  of  the  Taj 
Mahal — and  back  to  Japan  and  the  shadow  of  Fujiyama. 
And  there  alone  in  the  sky  among  the  stars  of  India, 
all  that  I  had  seen  seemed  but  a  little  thing;  for  this  is 
always  the  lot  of  the  wanderer,  that  the  true  tale  of  his 
journeyings  is  not  the  tale  of  the  things  he  sees,  but  the 
story  of  the  greater  things  he  passes  by. 


OLD  LOVE  AND  MODERN  COMEDY 

THIS  is  a  lesson  in  the  way  the  Englishman  rules  India. 
Hitherto  Beatrice  and  I  had  regarded  the  British  gov- 
ernment as  largely  irrelevant  so  far  as  we  were  con- 
cerned. The  old  Moguls  we  liked  because  they  had  been 
very  grand  and  were  now  safely  dead,  but  the  English- 
men, as  rulers,  had  no  romance  to  recommend  them. 
They  did,  we  discovered,  have  a  sense  of  humour. 

The  discovery  was  in  this  wise.  One  morning  Beatrice 
and  I  were  enjoying  the  calm  domestic  hour  between 
chota  hazri  and  breakfast.  I  was  spending  it  on  a  long 
letter  to  Japan,  and  she  in  writing  a  short  story  about 
the  Man  from  Missouri  and  me,  in  which  I  was  called 
Barbara,  and  was  most  flatteringly  described  as  an 
"American  girl  who  looks  like  a  Beardsley  poster,  with 
quantities  of  sunny  hair  and  the  sweetest  temper  in  the 
world."  It  was  safe  to  write  about  the  Man  from 
Missouri,  inasmuch  as  he  had  by  this  time  departed,  in 
search,  I  fancy,  of  ladies  less  disconcertingly  high-brow, 
and  equally  safe  to  discuss  me,  when  she  was  so  choice  in 
her  adjectives.  Just  as  I  had  stopped  to  speculate  upon 
a  further  invasion  of  marble  halls,  in  flew  a  telegram 
from  Herbert. 

"If  you  wish  to  leave  India  within  a  year,"  it  said,  "re- 
turn to  Calcutta  at  once." 

There  was  no  time  to  wonder  about  its  meaning — in- 
deed I  scarcely  dared  to.  The  immediate  necessity  was 
action,  and,  calling  Abdul,  we  proceeded  to  hurry  him 

359 


360  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

as  that  potentate  had  never  been  hurried  in  his  life.  In 
the  midst  of  the  resultant  whirl,  Beatrice,  having  with- 
drawn to  a  safe  corner  to  contemplate  railroad  sched- 
ules, announced : 

"Marjorie,  we  can  still  see  the  Taj  Mahal." 

"I  only  want  to  see  Japan,"  I  said. 

But  she  persisted.  If  we  got  the  train  that  left  in 
the  direction  of  Agra  in  an  hour,  we  should  be  in  Agra 
at  noon,  see  the  Taj  in  the  afternoon,  start  south- 
ward on  the  night  train,  and  arrive  in  Calcutta  as 
quickly  as  by  any  route. 

"Inasmuch  as  that  train  leaves  first,  let's  do  it,"  I 
said.  "It  will  be  a  comfort  to  feel  ourselves  moving  in 
any  direction." 

An  hour  later  we  arrived  at  the  station  breathless. 
There  stood  the  train,  all  ready  to  pull  out. 

As  we  were  speeding  to  the  ticket-window  the  British 
government  intercepted  us  in  the  shape  of  a  shy  young 
passport  official  who  must  forthwith  know  our  history 
and  business.  Our  history  was  of  no  importance.  As 
for  our  business,  we  had  none.  We  were  Americans,  and, 
if  necessary,  we  could  be  persuaded  to  confess  our  age. 
This  didn't  look  impressive  on  a  report,  especially  in  the 
days  when  it  was  still  the  duty  of  his  office  to  discover 
as  many  German  spies  as  possible,  or,  barring  that,  to 
fix  pacifism  or  other  doctrines  on  each  newcomer. 

While  he  was  still  probing  our  history  for  really  sig- 
nificant detail,  the  train  gave  a  jerk,  Abdul  shouted  fran- 
tically, "Memsahib!"  and  in  one  inconsiderate  leap  we 
landed  on  the  steps  of  a  first-class  carriage  to  which 
Abdul  was  clinging,  and  rode  blandly  away,  leaving  the 
British  government  gaping.  Then  it  occurred  to  us  that 
we  had  no  tickets.  But  no  one  came  to  question  our 
right  to  be  there,  and  we  proceeded  without  molestation 


OLD  LOVE  AND  MODERN  COMEDY   301 

to  Agra.  When  we  got  off  there,  we  walked  through  the 
gate  serenely,  in  undisturbed  enjoyment,  apparently,  of 
a  free  ride  from  Delhi.  Then  my  innate  honesty  as- 
serted itself : 

"Beatrice,"  said  I,  "we  really  ought  to  pay  for  our 
tickets." 

She  was  inclined  to  think  that  since  the  British  gov- 

o 

ernment  had  done  its  best  to  prevent  us  from  getting  to 
Calcutta  in  time,  and  since  we  had  escaped  on  a  goverri- 
ment  railroad,  we  were  quits.  But  I  had  a  conscience. 
So  I  walked  up  to  the  Babu  in  charge  of  the  ticket- 
window  and  laid  down  the  price  for  two  first-class 
tickets  and  a  servant's  ticket.  He  looked  embarrassed. 

"I  must  collect  a  fine,"  said  he.    "Thirteen  rupees." 

"Why?" 

"Because  you  did  not  buy  your  tickets  in  Delhi." 

We  explained  that  we  had  been  prevented  by  the 
lack  of  intelligence  in  the  British  government,  which 
had  neglected  all  its  good  chances  to  investigate  us 
when  we  did  not  happen  to  be  in  a  hurry.  We  said  he 
ought  to  be  grateful  for  the  privilege  of  dealing  with 
honest  folk  who  paid  their  debts  without  being  asked, 
and  we  did  not  propose  to  pay  a  fine.  He  said  he  could 
not  register  the  ticket  as  paid  in  Agra  without  adding 
the  penalty;  some  one  must  pay  those  thirteen  rupees. 
We  laid  down  the  just  price  for  the  tickets  and  departed. 

After  lunch  a  servant  came  rushing  up  to  us  in  great 
embarrassment.  There  was  some  one  to  see  the  mem- 
sahibs,  he  said ;  the  memsahibs  must  come  down  at  once. 
We  went  down  to  find  a  Babu  protesting  to  all  the  multi- 
tude that  we  were  thieves  and  robbers  and  dangerous 
enemies  of  the  government.  He  was  from  the  railroad, 
and  he  must  have  that  fine.  We  stood  on  our  honesty, 
and  refused. 


362  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

Then  he  broke  down :  "Ah,  memsahib,  me  poor  man — 
very  poor.  Yen  not  pay,  me  pay.  Government,  he  will 
collect.  Ah,  memsahib,  me  have  wife,  two  wives,  and 
many  sons;  if  I  pay,  they  starve.  Ah,  memsahib,  you 
pay  those  thirteen  rupees,  and  every  day  I  pray  to  God 
for  you.  Ah,  memsahib,  me  poor,  very  poor,  but  me  pray 
to  God." 

Wrathfully  we  entered  a  carriage  and  rode  to  the  sta- 
tion. When  we  reached  there,  we  found  that  we  were 
notorious  characters.  The  whole  army  of  Indian  offi- 
cials came  out  to  view  such  examples  of  crime.  We 
explained  and  explained.  But  in  vain.  We  might  have 
got  away  without  paying  for  tickets  at  all.  From  the 
railroad's  point  of  view  we  should  then  have  been  non- 
existent. But  it  was  a  rule  that  if  any  one  rode  from 
Delhi  to  Agra  without  first  getting  a  ticket,  he  must  pay 
a  fine.  By  offering  to  pay,  we  had  confessed  our  in- 
iquity. Therefore  the  fine  must  follow. 

At  last,  surveying  the  uniform  tint  of  dark  brown  in 
the  faces  around  her,  Beatrice  said  with  majesty:  "If 
there  is  a  white  man  in  this  place,  lead  us  to  him." 

There  was  a  discussion.  One  white  man  did  exist,  it 
seemed.  At  last  the  dusky  procession  escorted  us 
through  one  dingy  room  after  another  till  we  came  to  a 
lanky  Englishman,  seated  in  an  inner  sanctum  among 
books  and  papers.  In  a  great  flood  of  Oriental  eloquence 
our  sins  and  robberies  were  explained  to  him.  He 
looked  at  us  severely  as  one  about  to  administer  the  ut- 
most rigour  of  the  law.  We  told  our  story.  He  heard  it 
with  the  solemnity  of  a  judge.  Then  a  funny  little  smile 
flickered  over  his  face. 

"It's  fatal  to  be  honest  in  India,"  he  said. 

He  looked  the  record  of  the  ticket-agent  through  care- 


OLD  LOVE  AND  MODERN  COMEDY   3(i:{ 

fully:  "Two  ladies,  first  class,  and  servant— fine  thir- 
teen rupees." 

"The  Babu  is  right,"  he  said.  "If  we  collect  for  the 
tickets,  we  must  show  the  fine." 

He  did  some  lightning  arithmetic,  and  then  turned  to 
the  Babu  dramatically : 

"Babu,"  he  said,  pointing  to  us,  "what  do  you  see?" 

"Two  memsahibs,"  said  the  Babu  meekly. 

"No,"  said  he,  "you  are  mistaken — you  see  only 
one  lady." 

"Yes,  sahib,"  said  the  Babu,  salaaming  humbly.  "I 
see  one  memsahib." 

"And  how  did  this  one  lady  travel  to  Agra?" 

"First  class,  sahib." 

"No,  Babu,"  replied  the  Englishman.  "You  are 
strangely  misinformed.  She  travelled  second  class  with 
one  servant." 

"Yes,  sahib;  one  memsahib,  second  class,  with  one 
servant." 

"Babu,"  said  he,  looking  at  the  receipts  for  the  money 
we  had  paid  that  morning,  "I  am  amazed  at  you.  This 
record  is  plainly  incorrect.  Whereas  there  was  only  one 
lady  travelling  second  class,  you  have  written  that  there 
were  two  travelling  first  class.  All  these  Babus  can  see 
that  it  is  incorrect."  And  he  indicated  the  crowd  of 
witnesses,  who,  looking  blandly  at  Beatrice  and  me, 
were  now  ready  to  swear  that  we  two  were  one. 

"Yes,  sahib,"  said  they,  in  one  lying  chorus,  "the  rec- 
ord is  wrong.  We  see  one  memsahib,  who  travelled  sec- 
ond class." 

"Now,  this  one  memsahib,  who  travelled  second  class, 
with  one  servant,  will  pay  the  fare  from  Delhi  to  Agra 
with  the  penalty.  Make  out  the  record." 


364 

The  Babu  made  the  record.  It  came  to  exactly  thir- 
teen rupees  less  than  we  had  paid  that  morning  for  our 
two  first-class  tickets. 

The  Englishman  surveyed  the  new  receipt.  "What's 
this?"  he  asked.  "You  told  me  the  lady  owed  you  thir- 
teen rupees.  By  this  it  is  plain  that  we  owe  her  thirteen 
rupees.  Pay  them  to  the  lady." 

Meekly  the  Babu  produced  thirteen  rupees.  The  Eng- 
lishman handed  them  to  us,  bowing.  "Sorry,"  said  he. 
"I'm  afraid  this  doesn't  compensate  for  the  trouble." 

So  saying,  he  turned  abruptly  to  his  desk,  and  the  com- 
pany escorted  us  out,  bowing,  smiling,  beaming,  with 
Oriental  enjoyment  of  this  thoroughly  Oriental  bit  of 
trickery.  .  .  . 

A  few  minutes  later  the  memory  of  this  comedy  died  in 
silence  and  pure  awe;  for  Beatrice  and  I  stood  beneath 
the  Taj  Mahal,  the  memorial  of  human  love  that  we  had 
come  so  far  to  see.  Again  and  again  the  Taj  has  been 
called  the  most  beautiful  piece  of  architecture  in  the 
world ;  yet  all  the  paeans  of  architects  and  scribblers  and 
the  inarticulate  raptures  of  tourists  cannot  prepare  one 
for  its  utter  loveliness. 

Standing  so  delicate  and  white  against  the  blazing 
blue  of  the  sky,  so  set  apart  from  all  the  world  by  its 
mirroring  waters  and  cypress  trees,  it  seems  to  shine  like 
an  angel  with  some  inward  light,  to  be  itself  instinct 
with  pure  passion.  There  is  a  lyrical  grace  in  its  white 
springing  towers  and  snowy  domes,  in  the  exquisite 
detail  of  the  carven  walls  and  flowerlike  columns.  It 
has  the  quality  of  a  song,  a  love-song  bursting  spontane- 
ously from  the  heart.  One  would  fancy  that  only  spirits 
could  have  built  it,  and  that  it  rose,  as  some  old  temples 
are  said  to  have  risen,  like  an  exhalation  from  the  earth 
to  the  sound  of  fairy  music.  Standing  beneath  it,  I 


©  Publishers  Photo  Service 


Standing  so  delicate  and  white  against  the  blazing  blue 
of  the  sky 


OLD  LOVE  AND  MODEKN  COMEDY   :*<;-, 

thought  of  snowy-mountain  peaks  which  touched  me 
with  such  awe  as  I  then  felt,  of  the  pure  crown  of  Fuji, 
of  the  flashing  heights  of  Popocatapetl,  but  they  all 
seemed  crude,  careless,  rough-hewn,  against  the  sub- 
limity of  this  white  thing  that  the  hands  of  mortal  man 
had  fashioned. 

"I  wish  I  had  been  that  woman,"  said  Beatrice,  "to 
have  been  so  greatly  loved." 

"I  wish  I  had  been  the  man  who  made  it,"  I  answered. 

Tradition  says  that  he  was  Austin  of  Bordeaux,  who, 
coming  to  this  far  land  long  ago,  had  caught  and  en- 
shrined forever  the  utter  adoration  of  a  man  for  his  dead 
love.  Above  the  gladness  of  a  lady  so  honoured, — if  her 
disembodied  soul  could  know  the  honour, — above  the 
pride  of  the  great  king  who  had  paid  for  a  perfect  monu- 
ment to  the  queen  of  his  heart,  must  have  been  the  joy 
of  the  artist  in  the  lovely  thing. 

"I  should  think  his  spirit  would  haunt  this  place  for- 
ever," I  said  to  Beatrice,  "adoring  the  work  of  his  own 
hands." 

Afterward  we  wandered  through  the  palaces  where 
that  queen  had  lived.  She  had  been  no  idle  pampered 
lady,  for  she  had  insisted  on  going  with  her  prince  on 
all  his  military  expeditions,  and  almost  every  year  she 
had  given  him  a  little  princeling  or  princessling,  as  sign 
and  symbol  of  the  love  that  was  between  them.  And  so 
she  had  died  long  before  old  age  had  a  right  to  claim  her, 
worn  out  in  the  only  service  that  the  loving  women 
of  old  times  knew. 

Yet  she  had  been  a  queen  and  heir  to  many  queens 
who  dwell  within  those  marble  halls.  We  saw  the  tiny 
mosque  where  she  had  worshipped,  within  the  great 
outer  fortress  of  the  royal  walls,  delicate  as  a  temple 
carved  from  a  single  pearl.  We  saw  the  marble  baths 


366 

that  once  showered  rosewater  upon  her,  and  the  pa- 
vilions where  her  children  had  played,  inlaid  with  lotus 
flowers  in  carnelian,  jade,  and  malachite,  and  starred 
with  precious  stones. 

Other  queens  had  made  these  lovely  places  famous — 
Nurmahal,  and  that  Hindu  bride  of  Akbar,  and  even  a 
Portuguese  princess  who  introduced  crucifixes  to  scan- 
dalize the  devout  sons  of  the  prophet.  There  were  the 
chambers  they  had  occupied,  still  bearing  traces  of  their 
whims  and  pleasures.  There  was  the  room  with  its 
marble  floor  laid  out  in  squares,  whereon  the  queens 
played  chess,  with  their  maidservants  as  living  pawns. 
Many  a  tragic  story  of  sons  that  grew  up  to  break  their 
father's  hearts  lingered  among  these  royal  relics,  and 
wayward  ghosts  seemed  to  lurk,  still  impenitent,  in  si- 
lent corridors. 

These  stories  were  all  retailed  to  us  by  a  grey-beard 
son  of  the  prophet  whom  we  found  sitting  lonely  among 
the  ruins.  He  had  small  interest  in  queens,  save  to 
lament  that  a  wise  king  like  Akbar  could  ever  have  fallen 
victim  to  the  wiles  of  a  heathen  princess,  a  Hindu  or  a 
Portuguese.  With  sorrow  he  pointed  out  the  shrines 
that  had  held  "idols."  But  he  was  full  of  the  dramatic 
encounters  of  father  and  son,  and  of  councillors  of  state 
with  princes  and  self-willed  monarchs.  With  delight  he 
pointed  out  a  sloping  ascent  to  a  throne.  There  was  a 
Hindu  who  would  not  bow  before  the  Mohammedan  em- 
peror. But  when  he  had  come  into  the  royal  presence,  he 
had  toiled  up  this  ascent  and  so  had  bowed  against  his 
will  and  knowledge,  and  the  pride  of  monarchy  was 
satisfied.  At  every  marble  entrance  our  old  story-teller 
would  stand  and  declaim,  with  fiery  exchange  of  dra- 
matic dialogue,  the  family  secrets  of  the  proud  race  that 
had  lived  here  long  ago.  So  Homer  must  have  sung  of 


OLD  LOVE  AND  MODERN  COMEDY   3r.7 

the  exploits  of  Troy.  So  the  Hebrew  fathers  must  have 
told  to  their  children  the  story  of  Moses,  of  David,  of 
Esther. 

And  while  we  listened,  the  British  Tommy  who  had 
been  detailed  to  escort  us  smiled  with  the  superiority 
of  a  son  of  London  to  mere  fairy  tales,  and,  twirling  a 
silver-headed  cane  which  seemed  oddly  at  variance  with 
his  uniform,  spat  casually  at  the  jewelled  flowers  that 
adorned  these  haunts  of  the  old-time  queens.  lie  too 
was  a  sample  of  the  way  in  which  the  Englishman  rules 
India.  For  when  we  had  arrived  at  the  great  outer  wall 
of  the  palace,  we  had  learned  that  we  could  not  enter 
without  a  pass.  The  pass  must  be  obtained  at  the  police- 
station  before  two  o'clock  in  the  afternoon.  (It  was 
then  three,  and  we  were  leaving  at  midnight. )  All  this 
the  Tommy  on  guard  explained  with  the  nonchalance  pe- 
culiar to  Tommies.  We  were  determined  not  to  yield. 
Patiently  we  listened  while  the  law  was  explained  to 
us.  After  the  experience  of  the  morning  we  had  begun 
to  feel  that  there  were  possibilities  which  did  not  always 
meet  the  eye  in  English  laws  administered  by  English- 
men. 

So  Beatrice,  summoning  the  witchery  she  did  not  hesi- 
tate to  use  on  occasion,  smiled  sweetly  into  the  eyes  of 
the  stubborn  Tommy  and  asked,  gently:  "But  surely 
you  could  do  something  about  it,  just  to  help  and  oblige 
us." 

"Might  cut  some  red  tipe,"  said  he,  with  a  gleam  of  a 
smile  on  his  crude  features.  Forthwith  he  sent  us 
through  the  gates  without  further  ado,  under  the  es- 
cort of  another  Tommy,  who  had  nothing  at  all  to  say 
for  himself,  but  seemed  to  serve  all  inquiring  sentinels 
in  lieu  of  an  official  pass.  A  wonderful  race,  these 
Englishmen!  They  don't  need  sensible  laws,  because 


368  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

they  are  so  intelligent  about  disobeying  those  they  have. 

At  sunset  we  stood  on  the  marble  balcony  where  at- 
tendants had  brought  out  the  bed  of  the  dying  king  that 
he  might  look  out  over  the  waters  to  the  Taj,  and  pass 
out  of  life  with  his  eyes  upon  its  shining  towers.  It  was 
now  no  longer  white,  but  delicately  coloured  by  the  sun- 
set, and  bloomed  out  of  the  blue  distance  with  the  soft 
flush  and  life  of  a  rose.  We  saw  it  once  more  in  the 
starlight.  The  waters  at  its  feet  were  studded  with 
burning  points  of  light,  and  the  spangled  heavens 
sparkled  around  it.  In  the  darkness  it  seemed  like  a 
lovely  ghost,  shimmering,  alive,  elusive. 

Under  its  dim  towers  we  lingered  till  the  gates  with- 
out were  closed  at  midnight,  and  then  we  started  on 
a  swift  and  wild  excursion  back  to  Calcutta  and  Herbert 
and  the  ship  that  was  to  bear  me  to  Japan. 


CHAPTER  XLVI 

LADDIE 

OF  all  the  nights  of  my  Oriental  wanderings,  that  was 
the  longest,  though  its  terrors  were  only  psychological. 
The  train  pulled  out  at  two  o'clock  in  the  morning;  and 
Beatrice  and  I,  having  begun  the  evening  with  ghostly 
communings  with  the  Taj,  roamed  aimlessly  around  the 
station  for  two  mortal  hours,  feeling  desperately  alone 
and  charterless. 

For  we  knew  nothing  of  Agra.  We  had  neither 
friends  nor  guidance,  and  a  weary  journey  of  two  days 
lay  before  us.  This  northern  land  was  very  different 
from  Calcutta.  There  was  an  amazing  number  of  great 
turbaned  creatures  with  firearms  about;  and  by  night, 
in  the  eyes  of  two  homeless  ladies,  their  doings  seemed 
fearful  and  mysterious,  and  their  language  harsh  and 
secret.  Moreover  the  night  was  cold,  and  cold  adds 
strangely  to  the  sense  of  desolation  and  terror.  In  trop- 
ical darkness  there  is  something  warm,  human,  caressing 
that  allays  one's  fear. 

"May  I  find  you  some  tea?"  asked  a  voice  from  the 
shadows.  It  was  "Laddie,''  a  gentle  Scotch  boy  in  a 
lieutenant's  uniform  whom  we  had  met  that  afternoon 
at  the  hotel.  After  fighting  three  years  in  France  and 
being  wounded  (and,  incidentally,  tended  in  his  pain  by 
the  Empress  Eugenie  herself),  he  had  been  quite  un- 
ceremoniously transferred  to  India.  He  didn't  like  it, 
and  didn't  know  why  he  was  there.  His  psychology,  in 
fact,  was  rather  mixed,  as  was  so  often  the  case  with 

369 


370  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  finer  boys  who  had  gone  through  these  years.  He 
was  shy  and  melancholy  and  full  of  brooding  thoughts, 
which  found  expression  only  now  and  then  in  broken 
phrases  and  remarks  which  he  covered  as  soon  as  uttered 
by  descent  to  platitudes  and  the  commonplace. 

The  warmth  with  which  we  met  the  suggestion  of  tea 
made  him  blush  and  smile  with  pleasure.  He  disap- 
peared and  shortly  returned  with  a  sleepy  "boy"  bear- 
ing a  concoction  which,  on  any  civilized  table,  would 
have  been  poison  and  anathema,  but  which  at  that  mo- 
ment seemed  to  exude  utter  comfort  with  its  steam. 
With  it  came  bananas,  bread,  and  buffalo  butter.  Glee- 
fully we  placed  it  on  a  trunk,  and,  lighting  it  with  a 
lantern,  camped  on  some  other  luggage  and  drank  it 
merrily.  There  in  the  coldness  and  the  darkness  our 
hearts  warmed  to  each  other.  We  discussed  a  thousand 
things  which  find  small  place  in  tea-table  conversation 
by  day — love,  war,  ethics,  and  religion.  He  had  hardly 
talked  to  a  girl  for  years,  he  said.  He  told  us  about  his 
mother  and  his  younger  sister,  with  little  broken  refer- 
ences to  the  war.  And  in  all  his  words  and  manner 
there  were  a  shy  protecting  tenderness  and  gratitude  and 
wonder  that  we  should  condescend  to  talk  to  him  at  all. 

Then  it  developed  that  he,  too,  was  going  to  Calcutta. 
Through  all  that  long  lonely  journey  he  would  be  on 
the  train.  I  could  feel  relief  in  all  Beatrice's  being. 
Poor  girl!  She  had  no  such  background  of  unescorted 
wandering  as  mine  to  support  her  against  the  terrors 
that  always  invade  the  night  in  lonely  places.  For 
hitherto  Herbert  had  been  with  her  in  her  Eastern 
travels.  This  tour  of  ours  was,  for  her,  pure  heroism. 

At  two  o'clock  in  the  morning  Laddie  left  us  in  our 
carriage,  and  the  train  pulled  out  into  sharp  cold  dark- 
ness. Beatrice  had  discovered  that  we  were  the  only 


LADDIE  .  371 

women  on  board.  In  a  big  American  Pullman  this 
would  not  have  been  so  disconcerting.  Hut  locked  up 
in  the  little  carriage,  with  no  immediate  way  of  calling 
a  conductor  or  a  porter,  we  felt  alone  and  helpless.  It 
was  all  right,  so  long  as  the  train  kept  moving.  But 
when  it  stopped,  as  it  seemed  to  do  every  few  minutes, 
in  the  midst  of  dark  plains,  we  seemed  to  be  mobbed  by 
wild  men  without.  Huge  turbaned  creatures,  appar- 
ently with  firearms,  would  rattle  our  windows  and  try 
our  doors.  Probably  their  only  purpose  was  to  see  that 
we  were  unharmed,  for  white  women  on  an  Indian  rail- 
way are  carefully  protected.  Every  railroad  official 
knows  where  they  are  and  wrho  they  are  and  is  held  re- 
sponsible for  their  safety.  But  we  had  no  way  to  tell 
friends  from  enemies.  Once  the  train  stopped  with  a 
jerk,  and  Beatrice  shrieked.  I  opened  my  eyes  to  see  a 
fierce  dark  bandit  standing  in  our  doorway. 

"Oh,  come  in,"  said  I  casually,  sitting  up. 

He  salaamed  and  withdrew.  Beatrice  scolded  me  in 
a  temporary  fury  of  terror,  asking  me  what  I  meant 
by  inviting  villains  in  like  that.  "He  was  a  train  offi- 
cial," I  said,  guessing  rashly. 

After  three  hours  we  were  suddenly  dumped  out  at 
a  little  station  in  the  chill  of  the  hour  preceding  dawn. 
We  were  to  change  to  another  train  and  look  at  a  sweep 
of  dark  prairie  beneath  the  cold  stars,  till  it  arrived. 
Laddie  appeared.  He  was  shivering  and  not  at  all  sure 
of  his  bearings,  either,  but  we  hailed  him  warmly  as  a 
friend  and  deliverer. 

"The  question  is,"  he  said,  "where  can  we  get  hot  tea?" 

Even  here  this  blessed  institution  of  British  India 
proved  to  be  available  in  strong  black  cupfuls  served  by 
a  shadowy  figure  from  a  white  pitcher.  We  warmed  our 
hands  against  the  sides  of  the  cup,  and  thawed  out  in 


372  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

the  steam,  and  scalded  our  throats  deliciously.  The  tea 
once  consumed,  we  relapsed  into  forlorn  chilliness. 
Some  distance  away  we  saw  a  pail  of  hot  charcoal  near 
which  two  Afghans  wrapped  in  great  shawls  lay  sleep- 
ing. 

"Let's  get  them  to  share  it  with  us,"  said  Laddie. 

We  established  ourselves  next  to  them.  They  rolled 
over  with  quick  motions  of  self-defence,  glared  at  us 
wildly,  and  then,  seeing  why  we  had  come,  hospitably 
made  room  for  us  among  their  shawls,  smiled  with  a 
flash  of  white  teeth  in  the  dimness,  and  went  back  to 
sleep. 

This  was  a  little  more  comfortable.  The  sight  of  the 
burning  coals  seemed  itself  to  warm  us,  and  we  hoarded 
each  slight  wave  of  heat  in  our  muffling  coats.  By  this 
time  it  seemed  as  if  the  night  had  lasted  an  eternity. 
The  day  and  its  experiences  seemed  like  something  in 
another  life,  and  we  felt  as  if  we  should  never  see  the 
sun  again.  But  there  was  a  mutual  comfort  and  tender- 
ness in  each  other's  presence;  and  we  were  grateful  to 
the  gentle  boy  who  shadowed  us  so  protectingly. 

Our  train  came  at  last,  and  eventually  the  dawn. 
With  it  our  senses  returned,  and  the  terrors  fled  away. 
The  landscape  looked  rather  commonplace,  like  a  neg- 
lected corner  of  Kansas,  and  by  day  the  pirates  and 
bandits  who  infested  the  night  turned  out  to  be  train- 
guards  and  servants.  We  invited  Laddie  to  share  our 
carriage  during  the  day,  and  amused  each  other  with 
all  the  silly  games  we  could  think  of  and  with  reading 
the  cheap  novels  in  shilling  editions  that  Laddie  col- 
lected from  wayside  news-stands.  Like  tea,  shilling 
novels  are  one  of  the  ubiquitous  comforts  with  which 
the  Englishman  furnishes  the  wilderness.  After  the 
long  and  melancholy  years  of  war,  breaking  so  rudely 


LADDIE  37.'? 

into  boyhood,  our  gratitude  and  merry  companionship 
reduced  poor  Laddie  to  a  Dante-like  state  of  humble  de- 
votion. For  he  was  a  gentleman,  every  inch  of  him, 
though  a  simple  lad.  Beatrice,  used  to  dividing  men 
into  classes  according  to  notions  of  continental  gentry, 
was  inclined  to  credit  him  with  "gentle"  birth,  and  some 
inherited  estate  and  dignity  among  the  barren  hills  of 
Scotland.  But  for  aught  I  know  his  father  may  have 
kept  shop  in  Edinburgh. 

But  that  long  day  of  mutual  and  child-like  comrade- 
ship between  two  lonely  girls  and  a  lonely  boy  whom  we 
never  saw  again  remains  in  my  memory  as  one  of  those 
beautiful  human  contacts  which  can  exist  only  between 
travellers.  Friendship  and  love  must  be  made  of  stout 
and  common  stuff  to  stand  the  wear  and  tear  of  long 
acquaintance  and  full  knowledge.  But  between  strang- 
ers who  but  meet  and  pass,  there  may  often  be  a  mo- 
mentary delicacy  and  romance  of  human  kindliness, 
some  casual  blossom  of  courtesy  and  gratitude  which 
would  shrivel  in  the  rude  heat  and  rush  of  real  life, 
but  which  survives  in  enduring  grace  among  the  wan- 
derer's memories.  So  in  the  long  procession  of  cheap 
and  comic  men  who  crossed  my  path  around  the  world, 
Laddie  is  one  who  stands  a  little  apart,  because  he  was 
gentle  and  modest  and  served  us  like  queens  and  angels 
for  a  day. 

Laddie's  virtues  were  not,  however,  appreciated  by  the 
railroad  guards.  At  six  o'clock  in  the  evening  we 
stopped  for  dinner  at  a  wayside  town.  Now,  it  is  a  rule 
that  after  twilight  sets  in  all  ladies'  carriages  must  be 
guarded  with  fierce  and  moral  virtue.  So,  after  dinner, 
as  Laddie,  by  our  invitation,  stood  on  the  steps  of  the 
carriage  talking  to  us,  with  doors  wide  open  and  the 
whole  of  India  welcome  to  play  chaperon  if  it  would, 


374  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

along  came  a  most  righteous-looking  Englishman  in 
some  official  garb,  and,  seizing  him  by  the  collar,  hurled 
him  from  the  steps. 

"None  of  that,  young  man !"  said  he. 

Poor  Laddie's  face  flamed.  The  uniform  of  a  lieu- 
tenant in  His  Majest}r's  army  was  not  used  to  being 
handled  like  that,  and  for  a  moment  we  expected  to  be 
heroines  of  a  fight.  Beatrice  said  promptly  and  deci- 
sively :  "Lieutenant  Campbell  is  a  friend,  and  we  asked 
him  to  stop  a  minute  and  chat  before  the  train  leaves." 

"Don't  know  who  is,  and  don't  care,"  said  our  self- 
constituted  protector  in  a  strong  cockney  voice.  "But 
I  knows  the  rules  on  this  railroad." 

Beatrice  was  inclined  to  tell  him  that  we  would  man- 
age our  own  affairs,  but  Laddie  settled  the  matter  by 
bowing  and  withdrawing. 

As  the  train  moved  out  and  darkness  fell,  the  ghosts 
of  uncanny  terror  again  began  to  walk  abroad.  Then 
I  had  an  inspiration.  Moving  over  to  the  bunk  where 
Beatrice  was  trying  to  shiver  herself  to  sleep,  and  piling 
my  steamer  rugs  on  top  of  hers,  I  took  her  in  my  arms. 

Cuddling  her  head  down  against  my  shoulder,  she 
went  to  sleep  like  a  little  girl,  and  thinking  how  soft  and 
sweet  and  pretty  she  was,  and  feeling  very  motherly 
and  protecting,  I  forgot  to  worry  about  the  inexplicable 
happenings  without,  and  fell  asleep  too.  So  we  rode 
happily  and  warmly  through  the  night,  comforted  in 
each  other's  arms. 

Dawn  shone  hotly  upon  us — for  we  had  come  back 
into  tropical  country — and  then  the  train  came  to  with 
a  jerk,  in  Calcutta.  And  Herbert  himself  was  standing 
in  the  doorway,  flourishing  letters  for  me  from  far-off 
Japan,  and  ready  to  tell  Beatrice  how  he  had  perished 
of  loneliness  without  her.  In  the  lovers'  jubilations 


LADDIE  37.", 

which  followed,  some  one  passed  us  and  bowed  rather 
wistfully. 

"There  goes  our  sweetheart,"  said  Beatrice. 

"Where?"  asked  Herbert,  glaring  at  a  retreating  back 
clothed  in  khaki.  It  was  Laddie. 

Neither  Beatrice  nor  I  ever  saw  him  again. 


CHAPTER  XLVII 

SUSPENSE 

THE  jubilations  of  our  return  were  short-lived,  at  least 
for  me.  Even  as  I  clutched  the  first  letters  from  Sydney 
which  I  had  had  since  I  left  the  Philippines,  I  could  see 
some  shadow  falling  over  Herbert's  face. 

Once  or  twice  he  started  to  speak,  but  allowed  him- 
self to  be  diverted  by  Beatrice's  joyous  chatter,  till  Bea- 
trice herself  asked,  "What  did  you  mean  by  scaring 
Marjorie  to  death  with  that  telegram?" 

"I  am  afraid  it  means  that  Marjorie  must  postpone 
her  wedding,"  he  replied  soberly,  and  then,  as  I  said 
nothing,  and  Beatrice  suddenly  reached  over  and  took 
my  hand  between  hers  and  held  it,  he  plunged  in. 
"There  is  no  possibility  of  a  sailing  to  Japan  for  six 
months.  Yours  was  cancelled,  just  as  I  feared.  I  didn't 
tell  you  because  I  did  not  want  to  spoil  your  trip,  and  I 
thought  I  could  do  something,  but  I  can't.  I  have 
turned  Heaven  and  earth  and  the  American  consular 
offices  upside  down,  and  it's  hopeless.  There's  just  one 
chance  of  getting  out  of  India,  and  I  think  you'd  better 
take  it,  before  the  British  government  wakes  up  and 
makes  some  rule  to  keep  you  here." 

"What  is  that?" 

"A  ship  that  sails  for  New  York  next  week,  via  South 
Africa." 

"South  Africa,"  said  Beatrice,  "why,  Herbert,  you 
might  as  well  talk  of  the  South  Pole." 

"It  is  that  or  nothing,"  said  Herbert,  "and  Sydney  can 

376 


SUSPENSE  377 

get  back  to  New  York  much  more  easily  than  he  ran  gel 
to  India." 

Here  then  was  the  end  of  my  hopes.  It  seemed  im- 
possible that  any  man  should  pursue  a  girl  who  had  so 
constantly  disappointed  him,  and  all  on  a  wild  goose 
chase.  How  could  I  explain?  A  cable  was  no  medium 
for  delicate  negotiations. 

But  to  Herbert  I  merely  said,  "All  right,  I  will 
take  that." 

"We  will  clinch  it  at  once,"  he  said,  stopping  the  taxi 
in  front  of  the  steamship  office.  "Or  perhaps,"  he  added 
gently,  "you  want  to  cable  to  Sydney  first." 

I  cabled,  explaining  as  best  I  could  and  asking  Sydney 
if  he  couldn't  possibly  return  to  New  York  before  June. 
And  then  followed  days  of  waiting.  Morning  after 
morning  dawned,  and  I  thought  surely  that  sunset 
would  see  the  cessation  of  suspense.  But  no  answer 
came.  Well,  there  was  the  end  of  it!  The  letters  that 
Herbert  had  given  me — the  only  real  letters  from  Syd- 
ney I  received  in  all  this  journey,  with  all  their  plans  for 
January  and  after,  seemed  cruelly  ironical. 

In  the  interval  before  I  sailed,  some  of  the  Americans 
in  Calcutta,  who  are  jute  manufacturers,  invited 
Beatrice  and  me  to  come  out  and  stay  at  the  beautiful 
homes  where  they  keep  bachelor  hall.  These  jute 
dwellings  stand  under  the  very  eaves  of  the  old  Serama- 
pore  mission,  the  first  American  mission  in  India,  and 
one  of  the  few  Protestant  foundations  of  the  sort 
which  have  nobility,  dignity,  and  mellowness.  There 
was  something  of  the  air  of  Yale  and  New  England 
about  the  old  Baptist  college — an  austere  and  honour- 
able tradition  not  only  of  service  but  of  learning. 
Near  by  the  group  of  the  jute  manufacturers'  homes 
stood  like  college  fraternity  buildings.  And  when  we 


378  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

were  jubilantly  received  there  by  a  horde  of  young 
men,  and  showered  with  all  the  luxury  that  women 
command  in  the  Orient,  we  felt  as  if  we  had  returned 
to  the  old  days  of  the  junior  prom  and  the  fraternity 
hop.  Instead  of  dancing,  however,  we  played  ten- 
nis in  the  twilight.  There  was  an  Oriental  leisure 
and  ceremony  about  that  tennis.  Each  player  was  at- 
tended by  three  turbaned  lackeys.  One  ran  after  the 
balls ;  one  served  tea,  from  a  little  summer-house  at  the 
edge  of  the  court ;  and  a  third  stood  by  to  fan  away  the 
mosquitoes  and  wrap  one  in  sweaters  the  minute  one 
paused  in  this  elegant  pursuit  of  exercise. 

All  around  the  jute-makers'  homes — and  the  mission 
which  has  tried  to  spread  the  gospel  of  Christian  justice 
for  a  hundred  years — are  the  jute-fields  which  feed  the 
American  luxury  that  we  had  enjoyed.  But  no  comfort 
and  grace  have  extended  beyond  these  American  settle- 
ments. The  mission  has  been  helpless  to  alleviate  the 
evils  of  a  growing  industry  except  with  private  charity. 
And  the  jute  men — well,  that  is  how  fortunes  are  often 
made,  and  these  Americans  are,  like  the  rest,  indi- 
vidually good  men  and  gracious  hosts,  but  socially  part 
of  a  system  that  feeds  the  rich  on  the  very  life  of  the 
poor.  The  condition  of  the  jute  industry  is  one  of  the 
many  blots  on  capitalism  abroad. 

The  jute  country  round  about  is  a  melancholy  land. 
One  drives  for  miles  through  jungly  avenues.  There  are 
poor  little  mud  houses  hidden  in  the  rank,  tough  vegeta- 
tion, and  pools  of  stagnant  waters  reflecting  palms.  The 
bright,  cold,  clean  water  of  the  Occident  is  not  here,  nor 
the  clean  fresh  earth.  Everything  seems  soaked  with  the 
poison  of  a  thousand  years,  fetid,  reeking.  Draped  fig- 
ures sit  at  the  roadside,  begging.  Drab  women  they  are, 
and  shameless.  Those  that  can  afford  to  go  clad  in  scar- 


SUSPENSE 

let  and  purple  do  not  show  their  dangerous  beauty  to 
men  in  India.  So  we  saw  only  those  too  poor  to  care,  to 
claim  protection.  Around  them  sprawled  their  naked 
offspring,  each  wearing  a  bangle  or  a  chain.  When  we 
came  into  sight,  the  mothers  would  pull  the  babes  out  of 
the  dust,  set  them  on  their  feet,  give  them  a  little  spank, 
and  send  them  to  beg. 

One  winsome  lassie  of  three,  whose  costume  consisted 
of  a  bracelet,  had  the  most  enticing  of  feminine  glances, 
and  lips  sweet  enough  to  kiss  even  under  the  dirt  that 
covered  them.  Her  hair  curled  on  her  head  in  ringlets 
which  the  light  of  the  sun  had  faded  on  the  ends  to  gold. 
She  coquetted  with  us  gleefully,  scampering  away  to 
hide  behind  the  leaves,  and  emerging  suddenly  like  a 
little  brown  earth  fairy — till  her  mother  noticed  our  in- 
terest, and,  summoning  her  sharply,  whispered  some- 
thing in  her  ear.  With  her  smiling  lips  drawn  down  and 
her  sweet  voice  attuned  to  the  beggar's  whine,  she  re- 
turned to  us,  holding  out  one  chubby  hand  tearfully, 
while  with  the  other  she  patted  her  plump  little  waist— 
to  suggest,  apparently,  the  unfed  cavity  within. 

Often  the  boys  would  run  after  our  automobile.  Lean, 
swift  creatures  they  were,  and  they  ran,  begging  between 
gasps,  till  they  sank  by  the  wayside  panting  and  weep- 
ing with  weariness  and  the  beggar's  self-pity.  Some- 
times we  gave  like  the  man  in  the  Scriptures,  worn  out 
with  overmuch  importunity.  And  while  the  children 
shrieked  at  us  from  below,  reinforced  by  their  half- 
veiled  mothers,  the  monkeys  in  the  trees  above  gravely 
dropped  leaves  upon  us,  and  cursed  us  in  all  the  tongues 
of  the  bander-log. 

These  were  mostly  hangers-on  of  families  working  at 
starvation  wages  in  one  of  the  most  prosperous  of  In- 
dian industries,  an  industry  which  piles  up  fortunes 


380  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

for  white  men  almost  overnight.  Here  and  there  we 
saw  the  jute-fields  tended  by  people  wretchedly  poor. 
And  looking  at  them,  I  thought  of  the  jute-mills,  of  the 
pregnant  women  working  there,  of  children  sprawling 
there,  crying  for  the  sweet  warm  touch  of  the  tired 
breasts  of  mothers  who  could  not  heed  them  because 
they  were  too  busy  making  white  men  rich.  Then  I 
thought  of  the  beautiful  bungalows  where  I  had  en- 
joyed the  utmost  luxury  that  chivalry  could  command 
or  the  lonely  white  man  in  exile  throw  at  the  feet  of 
woman — I  thought  of  all  this  as  I  rode  away  from  scenes 
of  gaiety  and  hospitality.  So  white  men  have  done  in 
the  Orient,  knowing  nothing  of  "welfare  laws"  and 
eight-hour  days,  drawing  the  blood  of  many  dusky 
women  and  little  children  that  one  lady  of  their  own  may 
go  shining  in  jewels  and  sleep  delicately  at  night,  and 
ride  softly  by  day,  looking  ruefully  and  helplessly  upon 
the  poverty  that  feeds  her  wealth. 

It  is  no  one  man's  doing — it  is  the  fault  of  things  as 
they  still  are. 


CHAPTER  XLVIII 

SCANDALS 

THE  day  of  my  sailing  had  come.  Beatrice  escorted 
me  to  the  ship,  and  one  of  my  kind  hosts  of  the  jute  firm 
sent  roses  to  perfume  my  prospects.  And  truly  my 
prospects  needed  some  grace.  No  answer  from  Sydney 
had  come.  Probably  he  thought  I  was  not  worth  it, 
and  I  scarcely  blamed  him.  The  ship  to  which  I  was  in- 
definitely committed  was  a  shabby  little  thing  which 
looked  capable  only  of  busy-body  ministrations  between 
river  ports.  Nor  did  my  fellow  passengers  seem  more 
promising.  They  had  the  appearance  of  a  collection  of 
characters  made  up  for  a  stock  company  production. 

As  we  stood  there,  waiting  for  the  ship  to  cut  loose 
from  the  docks,  Herbert  came  shouting  up  the  gang- 
plank waving  a  cablegram. 

"I  knew  it,"  he  cried.  "That  bally  black  boy  delivered 
it  in  the  wrong  place — and  somebody's  fool  servant 
signed  for  it,  and  I  have  had  all  the  detective  forces 
known  to  myself  and  Abdul  after  it  ever  since." 

Worse  than  that,  I  afterwards  discovered,  for  it  had 
been  returned  to  Japan,  and  had  come  back!  While 
he  spoke,  I  was  tearing  open  the  envelope.  The 
first  word  sent  my  spirits  up  to  the  sky,  and  the  second 
even  higher;  for  the  first  word  was  "distraught,"  and 
the  second  "despair" — and  this  is  not  the  sort  of  vo- 
cabulary that  confirms  one's  worst  apprehensions  in 
such  cases. 

"Would  any  one  but  a  literary  man  use  distraught  in 

381 


382  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

a  cablegram,"  I  said  joyously  to  Beatrice,  as  I  gave  her 
the  message  to  read. 

"No  one  short  of  a  poet/'  she  answered. 

The  cable  went  on  to  say  that  Sydney  could  not  reach 
New  York  till  the  middle  of  the  next  summer  and  then — ! 
I  gave  copy  for  an  answering  cable  to  Herbert,  spending 
a  good  many  dollars  trying  to  make  it  sound  human, 
and  turned  back  with  joy  to  the  little  ship.  Even  South 
Africa  looked  hopeful  now. 

Nor  was  that  the  end  of  good  fortune. 

A  rosy,  dark-eyed  man  in  the  ship's  uniform  ap- 
proached us.  He  was,  he  said,  a  Yorkshire  "mon,"  and 
first  cousin  to  one  of  the  most  famous  of  living  authors, 
and  he  proceeded  to  prove  the  kinship  by  the  display 
of  an  indubitable  gift  o'  gab.  When  I  remarked  on  the 
prospects  of  South  Africa,  he  exclaimed : 

"What,  haven't  ye  heard?  This  ship's  not  going  to 
South  Africa.  She's  going  through  the  Canal.  Aye, 
aye,  first  passenger  ship  through  in  eighteen  months! 
She's  to  pick  up  the  leavin's  of  the  war." 

"Through  the  Suez  Canal  and  the  Mediterranean!" 
I  cried. 

The  Cousin  had  by  this  time  grown  cautious.  "So 
they  say.  This  isn't  official  I'm  giving  you.  We  don't 
know  where  we're  going — understand.  The  Captain's 
just  got  sailing  orders  to  the  next  port,  and  no  farther." 

"But  ultimately  we  shall  reach  New  York?" 

"Maybe  so.    Maybe  so.    I  couldn't  rightly  say." 

But  his  wink  was  reassuring,  and  Beatrice,  her  eyes 
bright  with  thoughts  of  Egypt  and  Italy,  whispered,  as 
she  kissed  me  good-bye,  "I  envy  you." 

Into  the  warm  twilight  I  steamed  out  alone  on  this, 
my  last  adventure.  For  a  few  moments  the  smoke  and 
mists  that  presage  the  darkness  in  Calcutta  hung  over 


SCANDALS  :is:j 

the  city,  rosy  still  with  sunset,  and  pierced  by  the  lights 
of  a  million  fires.  Standing  on  the  little  deck,  and 
watching  the  stars  take  full  possession  of  the  night,  1 
felt  like  Columbus  going  forth  to  discover  America.  Tin- 
ship  was  barely  larger  than  his,  I  believe,  and  my  course 
scarcely  less  uncertain.  Like  him,  perhaps,  on  his  lirst 
night  out,  my  thoughts  clung  to  the  idea  that  the  world 
is  really  round.  I  wonder  whether  those  reverend  men 
who  argued  the  matter  long  ago  thought  of  the  romantic 
comforts  latent  in  that  truth.  For  every  league  that  was 
taking  me  from  Japan  now  was  yet,  by  that  magical 
principle,  bringing  me  nearer  to  it.  And  in  that  thought 
I  found  a  consolation  Columbus  himself,  it  may  be,  did 
not  know. 

When  I  turned  in  from  the  balmy  darkness,  I  found 
my  cabin  pre-empted  by  a  sort  of  gipsy.  A  strange, 
dusky  creature  she  was,  with  the  regular  features  of  the 
Punjab  and  a  velvety  manner.  As  if  to  forestall  any  con- 
clusions of  my  own  regarding  her  race,  she  promptly  an- 
nounced that  her  mother  was  a  Greek  and  her  father  an 
Englishman.  In  the  Orient  the  half-caste  is  always  an 
outcast — doubly  outcast,  denied  alike  by  the  mother's 
and  the  father's  people.  And  those  doomed  to  wear  out 
their  lives  on  this  lonely  and  sorrowful  borderline  be- 
tween the  averted  faces  of  two  races  are  glad  enough  to 
escape  by  fictitious  heraldry.  Yet  I  noticed  that  her  ac- 
cent was  quite  free  from  the  curious  cadence  of  the 
native  born.  To  celebrate  our  prospective  alliance  as 
cabin-mates,  she  was  ordering  unlimited  champagne 
and  moselle.  Between  sips  she  began  to  scatter  jewels 
about  in  starry  confusion.  Gifts  of  her  husband,  she 
said — an  Englishman,  very  stiff,  very  earnest  and  good, 
and  passionately  in  love  with  her.  She  was  passion- 
ately in  love,  too,  she  announced,  and  she  wanted  to 


384  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

know  whether  I  had  any  experience  with  this  psycho- 
logical condition. 

All  night  she  tossed  and  moaned,  and  murmured  that 
she  missed  her  husband.  With  the  first  streak  of  dawn 
she  called  to  the  cabin-boy,  "Boy,  a  ci'grette,  please." 
When  the  smoke,  ascending  and  encircling  my  bunk, 
stirred  me  to  some  demonstration  of  my  presence  in  the 
world,  she  said  she  hoped  that  I  should  never  be  so  much 
in  love,  and  that  I  should  be  married  as  soon  as  possible, 
because  she  never  saw  a  nice  girl  without  wishing  her 
married.  And  with  that  she  called  the  boy  and  told  him 
to  bring  me  a  ci'grette,  too,  please. 

When  I  appeared  for  breakfast,  I  found  that  we  were 
stuck  in  the  mud  of  the  Hoogly  Kiver.  There  for  two 
days  we  stayed,  with  nothing  except  blank  yellow  water 
and  a  blanker  yellow  landscape  to  divert  us,  till  a  great 
wave  came  in  from  the  sea  and  washed  us  out.  During 
these  two  days  I  had  time  to  plumb  the  depths  of  the 
ennui  which  apparently  was  to  be  my  fortune  for  the 
next  sixty  days. 

The  first  day  promised  something  worse  than  ennui. 
A  rumour  went  abroad  through  the  ship  that  I  was  anti- 
British,  and  was  investigated  by  the  Captain  with  all 
due  solemnity.  Inasmuch  as  I  had  only  the  most 
amiable  sentiments  toward  his  Majesty's  subjects  I  was 
rather  puzzled  till  I  discovered  that  the  story  originated 
with  one  I  had. dubbed  Circe.  Circe  had  the  same  eth- 
nological background  as  my  cabin-mate,  but  of  course  she 
said  that  her  mother  was  a  Russian.  She  had  a  homely 
dark  face  and  an  enticing  figure  of  whose  charms  she 
allowed  no  one  to  remain  in  ignorance.  And  her  cultiva- 
tion of  the  men  on  board  was  systematic.  When  her  hus- 
band, a  burly,  crude  Englishman,  had  brought  her  on 
board  the  first  night,  he  had  glanced  around  the  deck  at 


SCANDALS  ;}sr> 

our  grotesque  collection  of  men,  and  had  remarked  with 
an  expression  somewhere  between  a  sneer  and  a  leer: 
"Well,  I  guess  you're  safe  this  trip."  Apparently  she 
was  rather  more  hopeful.  For  the  advantage  of  a  pass- 
ing Briton  before  whom  she  was  flaunting  her  banners 
the  next  day,  she  remarked  to  me  that  she  adored 
Englishmen. 

"Oh,  yes,"  I  answered.  "An  Englishman  is  all  right 
when  he  is  a  good  man.  But  he  doesn't  know  how  to  be 
devilish  with  any  grace." 

On  the  whole  I  thought  that  was  rather  a  compliment 
to  the  race.  But  she  reported  to  the  Captain,  whom  she 
was  cultivating,  that  he  must  watch  me  carefully,  be- 
cause I  was  anti-British.  The  Captain  was  a  helpless 
little  Welshman,  with  eyes  of  infantile  blue  and  soft 
pink  complexion.  Greatly  flustered,  and  apparently  be- 
lieving that  I  carried  bombs  and  a  wireless  equipment 
all  my  own,  he  came  trotting  around  to  inquire.  I  an- 
swered that  he  was  mistaken.  At  last,  being  somewhat 
pressed  and  irritated,  I  added,  with  some  hauteur,  that  I 
could  probably  boast  a  better  English  pedigree  than  any 
Briton  on  board.  Whereupon  the  Cousin  appeared, 
looked  rather  startled,  asked  if  any  of  my  family  be- 
longed to  Yorkshire ;  and  when  I  said  yes,  he  announced 
that,  though  he  didn't  claim  to  be  a  gentleman  himself, 
thank  God,  he  wasn't  one  to  stand  by  and  see  the  gentry 
of  Yorkshire  insulted  by  Welshmen  and  Russians.  This 
put  a  quietus  on  the  inquiry  for  the  time. 

However,  Circe  was  not  allowed  to  flourish  her  tongue 
with  impunity.  She  attached  a  lover  at  last,  an  anemic 
American  with  pale  red  hair.  His  experience  was  ap- 
parently limited  to  a  small  town  in  Ohio,  a  Childs  res- 
taurant in  New  York,  and  a  clerkship  in  Calcutta.  But 
she  announced  that  he  was  very  rich  in  his  own  country 


386  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

and  had  promised  to  introduce  her  to  various  members 
of  the  Four  Hundred.  Such  misapprehensions  are  one 
of  the  characteristics  of  these  sordid  adventures,  espe- 
cially between  people  whose  difference  of  nationality 
allows  for  no  checking  up  of  each  other's  boasts.  Though 
he  seemed  a  poor  sort  for  such  a  lively  creature,  his 
fate  was  soon  irrevocably  bound  with  hers.  For  the 
matrons  on  board  woke  up  and  decided  that  these  two 
must  be  ostracized. 

It  is  rather  hard  to  ostracize  two  people  in  a  space  no 
larger  than  a  city  apartment.  One  cannot  help  looking 
across  the  table  at  them  three  times  a  day.  But  ostra- 
cized they  were,  and  a  terrible  thing  it  was  to  see.  Abso- 
lutely committed  as  they  were  to  each  other's  sole 
company,  imprisoned  within  the  space  of  deck  and  tiny 
social  hall  and  omitted  from  every  social  event,  yet 
forced  to  witness  them,  knowing  no  relief  all  day  long 
from  the  deadly  presence  of  each  other,  no  marriage  on 
earth  could  have  been  a  closer  or  more  ghastly  bond  for 
the  time  being.  All  that  makes  even  a  loveless  marriage 
tolerable,  in  the  way  of  variety  of  scene  and  society  and 
outlook,  and  interests  outside  of  each  other's  company, 
was  here  lacking. 

The  matrons  who  thus  protected  our  morals  were  two, 
and  both  of  them  American  and  Irish  and  residents  of 
Brooklyn.  They  made  up  for  virtue  and  the  possession  of 
obvious  husbands  by  acidity  of  tongue  and  competition 
in  impressing  the  British  community  with  their  high  so- 
cial position  at  home.  Their  chaperonage  of  us  was 
rather  negative.  While  they  brought  the  rigours  of 
the  social  law  down  on  Circe,  they  did  nothing  to  pro- 
tect the  one  lone  girl  among  them — beyond  insinuating 
that  she  was  evidently  a  snob,  and  probably  not  so  much 
of  a  prude  as  she  looked. 


SCANDALS  :?ST 

Meanwhile  niy  roommate  (whom  1  called  Medea,  he- 
cause  of  the  testimony  of  her  tongue  that  she  was  Greek, 
and  her  face  that  she  was  Oriental)  found  a  physician 
for  her  passion  for  her  husband  in  the  Cousin.  Lie  knew 
how  she  felt  about  her  husband,  he  said,  because  he  felt 
that  way  about  his  wife,  who  was  a  golden-haired  angel, 
he  said,  and  pure  as  dew,  and  the  fact  that  she  was  now 
expecting  her  baby  so  far  from  him  would  not  let  him 
sleep  o'  nights.  So  he  used  to  come  along  in  the  evenings 
and  condole  with  Medea  through  the  keyhole. 

Then  he  began  to  get  very  anxious  about  my  welfare. 
Wouldn't  it  be  nice  if  I  had  a  cabin  all  to  myself?  Two 
ladies  couldn't  enjoy  sharing  a  tiny  cabin  in  such  hot 
weather.  Finally  he  announced  that  he  had  arranged  it. 
Great  is  the  power  of  an  officer  on  the  ship.  I  was  soon 
installed  alone  in  another  and  better  place,  and  Medea 
and  the  Cousin  were  left  to  console  each  other  without 
the  difficulties  of  chaperonage. 

A  few  days  later  the  School  for  Scandal  decided  they 
too  must  be  ostracized.  Thereupon  Medea  began  to 
reign  like  a  queen,  though  outlawed.  She  received  all 
her  meals  in  her  own  cabin,  or  shared  them  with  the 
Cousin  in  his  quarters ;  and  the  stewardess,  a  blooming 
little  English  woman  with  the  instincts  of  a  discreet 
ladies'  maid,  was  at  her  special  service.  And  sundry 
dainties  denied  to  the  rest  of  us  made  part  of  her  out- 
classed feasts.  Still,  I  must  say,  she  was  a  good  sort. 
She  behaved  always  with  dignity  and  quietness  and 
generosity.  She  indulged  in  no  scandal  or  other  un- 
pleasant remarks  and  in  no  recriminations  on  the  sub- 
ject of  other  ladies.  The  Cousin,  of  course,  discovered 
that  she  was  related  to  all  the  celebrities  of  India,  Brit- 
ish and  native.  But  he  suffered  from  dark  and  tragic 
moods  of  remorse — at  which  times  he  said  he  was 


388 

thinking  of  his  wife  and  she  was  an  angel,  God  bless 
her. 

While  all  these  dramas  were  unfolding,  we  had  extri- 
cated ourselves  from  the  mud,  on  the  morning  of  the 
third  day,  and  were  slipping  over  a  colourless  languid 
sea,  beneath  a  colourless  languid  sky,  to  Colombo,  in  the 
Island  of  Ceylon.  Having  exhausted  the  social  possibili- 
ties of  the  ladies  on  board,  I  began  to  observe  the  gentle- 
men with  more  attention.  Odd,  weatherbeaten  creatures 
they  seemed,  interested  mainly  in  whiskey  or  vulgar  gos- 
sip. The  two  husbands  appeared  to  be  a  better  sort,  but 
they  were  tame  attachments  to  their  wives  and  members 
of  the  School  for  Scandal.  There  was  one  exception,  a 
tall,  blue-eyed  lad,  just  a  boy,  but  every  bit  a  gentleman. 
The  lack  of  decent  society  on  shipboard  seemed  to  have 
converted  a  slight  youthful  shyness  into  reserve,  and  he 
moved  around  in  an  orbit  of  his  own,  which  seldom 
crossed  mine.  To  myself  I  called  him  N.  B.,  Nice  Boy, 
and  took  a  secret  pleasure  in  the  fact  of  his  wholesome 
presence.  Among  the  others  who  stood  out  by  reason  of 
some  special  distinction,  there  were  also  a  padre,  and 
the  drunken  ship's  doctor,  who  had  some  reminiscences 
of  a  gentleman  about  him. 

When  Sunday  came,  and  there  was  no  cessation  in  the 
unholy  activities  of  the  ship,  the  padre  decided  that 
something  should  be  done.  So  he  hung  up  a  sign  to  the 
effect  that  service  would  be  held  in  the  social  hall  at 
seven-thirty.  Seven-thirty  came,  and  so  did  the  padre,  all 
dressed  for  the  occasion — but  not  the  shadow  of  a  con- 
gregation. Below,  Medea  was  dining  with  the  Cousin; 
in  a  dark  corner  of  the  deck  Circe,  all  dressed  in  chif- 
fon, was  whispering  to  her  American.  A  crowd  was 
gathered  around  a  table  adorned  with  whiskey  and  soda 
and  cards.  And  there  sat  the  poor  padre  alone,  in  his 


SCANDALS  389 

garments  of  sanctity,  while  the  hand  of  his  watch  crept 
on  toward  eight.  I  knew  what  glee  there  would  be  in  the 
ship  next  day  when  it  was  reported  that  the  padre  had 
held  a  service  and  nobody  had  come,  and  I  thought  the 
reprobates  ought  not  to  be  allowed  to  put  it  over.  While 
I  inwardly  execrated  the  poor  judgment  of  the  man  in 
putting  his  sacred  function  to  such  insult,  I  thought  that 
two  or  three  perhaps  might  come,  if  they  had  a  leader, 
including,  possibly,  the  School  for  Scandal,  which  liked 
to  appear  virtuous.  Suddenly  a  spirit  of  mischief  pos- 
sessed me.  I  flew  down  the  deck. 

"On  my  word,"  I  said  blandly  to  Circe,  "is  this  the 
way  you  spend  Sunday  evening?" 

The  American  dropped  her  hand,  and  a  blush  of  deep 
brick-red  dyed  his  face.  "Don't  you  know  there  is  a 
service  to-night  and  every  one  is  expected  to  go?" 

Meek  and  shamefaced,  they  arose  and  went !  None  so 
weak  before  such  exhortations  as  the  guilty,  as  every 
downtown  evangelist  knows !  I  am  afraid  the  glee  with 
which  I  travelled  on  to  the  next  group  of  sinners  is  not 
recorded  to  my  credit  in  the  books  of  Heaven.  When  I 
intruded  on  the  cards  and  whiskey,  the  drunken  doctor 
jumped  up  and  said  of  course  he  was  coming  to  service. 
He  used  to  go  with  his  mother,  God  bless  her.  And  he 
led  his  delegation  in.  Meanwhile  the  loiterers  about  the 
deck  saw  people  gathering  and  strayed  in.  The  Doctor 
apparently  regarded  himself  and  me  as  master  and  mis- 
tress of  ceremonies,  and  taking  me  by  the  arm,  he 
made  me  stand  up  in  the  front  row  and  sing  all  the 
hymns  with  him  in  a  very  loud  voice. 

So  we  held  service,  and  I  am  sorry  to  record  that  no 
sinner  was  turned  from  his  evil  courses  in  consequence. 
The  main  result  was  that  I  made  the  acquaintance  of 
the  old  Doctor,  which,  in  the  end,  led  to  a  far  less  edify- 


390  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

ing  episode.  For  he  chose  to  declare  himself  to  all  the 
ship  a  victim  of  a  hopeless,  though  purely  imaginary, 
passion  for  myself.  He  elaborated  on  this  in  a  myth- 
making,  hyperbolical  spirit,  whenever  lie  got  a  good  glass 
of  whiskey — and  the  ship's  officers  thought  his  senti- 
mental confidences  amusing.  He  began  by  calling  me 
Light  of  His  Eyes,  which  he  later  changed  to  Light 
That  Failed.  It  was  not  so  entertaining  to  me  as  to  him, 
but  the  final  results,  which  I  will  tell  later,  rather 
cleared  the  murky  air  of  the  ship. 

After  about  a  week  a  new  scandal  went  abroad 
through  the  ship.  The  Captain,  it  was  said,  had  lost 
Ms  way.  For  among  the  other  sources  of  peace  and  har- 
mony among  us  was  a  standing  feud  between  the  Captain 
and  some  of  his  officers. 

"We  should  be  in  Colombo  to-day,"  said  the  Cousin. 
"But  God  knows  where  we  are." 

This  was  .cheerful  news.  If  we  got  lost  before  we 
reached  Colombo,  the  prospects  of  finding  New  York  via 
South  Africa  seemed  pretty  slim.  Or  was  it  by  Suez 
that  we  were  going?" 

But  twilight  brought  out  of  the  mists  lights  that  were 
more  than  stars,  and  it  seemed  we  had  reached  Colombo 
after  all.  All  night  we  lay  at  the  gates  of  the  shadow 
that  morning  would  make  yet  another  new  land,  and  in 
the  stillness  my  nerves  so  long  inured  to  the  throbbing 
of  the  ship  and  the  hiss  of  the  sea  seemed  to  wait  in  a 
mood  of  tense  expectancy,  as  if  for  some  strange  for- 
tune that  the  silence  might  bring. 

Next  morning  revealed  a  sunny  little  town,  beyond 
the  tossing  waves  of  the  harbour,  and  palms  silhouetted 
against  the  pure  bland  sunlight  of  a  tropical  island. 
Cheerful  black  boys  in  gay  petticoats  and  skull  caps 
came  around  to  row  us  to  shore,  and  naked  little  crea- 


SCANDALS  3<H 

tures,  many  of  whom  had  left  arms  or  legs  with  the 
sharks,  offered  to  dive  for  coins.  Barring  pennies  they 
would  like  a  ci'grette,  please.  They  had  a  gaiety  anil 
impudence  quite  foreign  to  the  sombre  inhabitants  of 
India,  and  their  command  of  English  was  excellent. 


CHAPTER  XLIX 

AT  THE  GATES  OF  THE  FAR  EAST 

THE  great  continent  we  know  as  India  has  some  graceful 
attachments.  One  of  these  is  Burma,  and  another  is 
Ceylon.  Ceylon  is  a  lovely  island,  lying  to  the  southeast 
of  the  mainland  of  India,  and  so  crowned  with  hills  and 
rimmed  with  the  tossing  sea  that  its  sunshine  has  a 
purity  and  zest  which  are  denied  to  the  dank  and  fever- 
ish heats  of  equatorial  lands.  The  inhabitants  are  a 
negroid  people,  cheerful,  cleanly,  and  prosperous,  and 
rather  better  initiated  into  the  ways  and  speech  of  their 
English  masters  than  the  people  of  India  proper.  From 
end  to  end  of  the  island  the  beautiful  land  yields  up  its 
romantic  and  princely  gifts — tea,  spices,  and  jewels.  It 
is  the  Indian  strand  that  the  old  mariners  dreamed  of, 
and  Columbus  himself  set  forth  to  find ;  and  the  utmost 
reaches  of  covetous  imagination  scarcely  exaggerated 
its  beauty  and  its  wealth. 

Yet  its  greatest  distinction,  to  my  mind,  is  the 
grandeur  of  its  contact  with  its  environing  seas.  Other 
tropical  islands  seem  often  to  melt  and  swoon  into  the 
sea,  or  lie  in  waveless  waters  as  in  a  quiet  lake.  Ceylon 
yields  in  no  such  easy  dalliance.  Cool,  barren,  aloof, 
the  eternal  sport  of  winds  that  no  sunshine  can  win  to 
gentleness,  and  of  waves  which  the  balms  and  spices  of 
the  sweet  air  of  the  isle  can  never  soothe  to  rest,  the  great 
sands  stretch  shining  into  the  tossing  sea.  Eow  on  row, 
the  palms  stand  with  heads  bent  forward  before  the  ever- 
lasting winds,  and  the  sea  beats  on  the  land  with  a  lonely 

392 


AT  THE  GATES  OF  THE  FAR  EAST   W, 

boom,  boom.  After  riding  through  the  sweet  country- 
side, through  cinnamon  fields,  and  lands  where  the  tea 
stands  in  long  rows  like  a  series  of  green  sofa  cushions, 
through  warm  folds  of  the  valleys  and  the  swarm  ing, 
living  jungle,  it  was  always  a  strange  and  stirring  ex- 
perience to  come  out  upon  that  solemn  shore. 

We  stayed  in  Ceylon  three  or  four  days,  during  which 
time  our  scandals  removed  themselves  to  hotels,  and 
we  had  peace.  Though  my  days  consisted  in  quiet  con- 
templation of  gems  and  palms  and  sea,  the  last  night 
was  enlivened  with  a  variety  of  experience.  For  N.  B., 
with  whom  I  had  hitherto  sustained  only  the  most  for- 
mal courtesies  of  shipboard,  suddenly  asked  me  whether 
I  would  go  on  shore  with  him  and  seek  out  the  theatre 
which  was  rumoured  to  function  in  this  wilderness. 
Assenting  gladly,  I  set  forth  with  a  joyous  sense  of 
freedom  from  the  annoyances  of  the  vulgar  and  sophisti- 
cated society  I  had  known  so  long.  When  we  got  into 
our  rickshaw,  we  particularly  instructed  the  boy  that  we 
were  seeking  a  theatre — a  t-h-e-a-t-r-e — and  he  said  he 
understood  perfectly.  Whereupon  he  started  directly 
away  from  the  lights  and  traffic  of  the  town  and  the 
sparkle  of  our  ship  in  the  harbour  waters,  down  a  dark 
and  jungly  road.  "Boy,"  said  we  sternly,  "it  is  a  theatre 
that  we  seek."  Did  he  understand?  He  understood  per- 
fectly, and  continued  on  his  way. 

Around  us  closed  in  the  shadows  of  the  jungle  so  deep 
that  our  eyes  could  not  pierce  the  darkness  save  where  a 
Buddha  tree  covered  with  great  waxen  white  flowers 
shimmered  wanly  and  dropped  its  petals  upon  us.  Once 
we  came  out  upon  the  sea,  and  saw  the  great  palms, 
black,  lonely,  remote,  against  the  sky,  and  heard  the 
boom,  boom,  boom  of  the  sea  upon  the  shore.  What  had 
this  to  do  with  footlights  and  paint?  Again  we  ex- 


394  IN  THE  EYES  OP  THE  EAST 

postulated.  Again  the  boy  swore  that  this  was  the 
route  to  the  theatre,  and  to  demonstrate  his  understand- 
ing of  our  wish,  stopped  short  and  gave  us  a  little  dra- 
matic exhibition.  Helplessly  we  signalled  him  to  move 
on,  and  picking  up  his  feet  as  blithely  as  a  horse  going 
home,  he  plunged  yet  deeper  into  the  darkness.  Then 
there  was  a  flicker,  a  glow — and  a  square  little  wooden 
shack  dimly  lit.  This,  said  he,  depositing  us  with  an 
air  of  triumph,  was  the  theatre.  And  it  was ! 

I  am  afraid  that  we  bought  our  tickets  with  some  feel- 
ing of  condescension,  and  strolled  down  the  aisle  to  the 
orchestra  seats  with  the  air  of  Broadway  accidentally 
walking  into  a  ten-cent  movie  at  Hayseed  Corners.  But 
our  pride  promptly  received  a  tumble.  For  every  one  of 
those  among  whom  we  aspired  to  sit  was  in  full  dress. 
There  they  sat,  stiff,  red-faced  English  women  in  d^col- 
lete"  black  gowns  and  puffy  men  in  white  shirt-fronts, 
and  as  we  sat  down,  twenty  frozen  stares  surveyed  our 
sporting  costumes  from  the  Oxfords  on  our  feet  to  the 
felt  hats  on  our  heads. 

The  time  at  which  the  performance  began  was  as 
formal  as  the  dress.  There  was  nothing  till  half-past 
nine.  Inasmuch  as  it  would  take  an  hour  to  return,  and 
we  must  be  on  shipboard  by  eleven,  or  be  forced  to  stay 
on  shore  to  the  delight  of  the  School  for  Scandal,  we  only 
came,  and  looked,  and  were  conquered  by  that  costumed 
assemblage. 

When  we  reached  the  ship,  we  found  a  turmoil.  The 
Doctor  in  a  state  of  undress  was  standing  like  a  tall 
ghost,  swearing  that  he  would  jump  overboard,  while  the 
rest  of  the  ship  stood  round  and  dissuaded  him  in  chorus. 
It  seems  that  he  had  lost  his  cane — which  came  from 
South  Africa  and  was  made  of  rhinocerous-skin  and 
tipped  with  silver — in  the  sea.  While  the  second  mate 


AT  THE  GATES  OF  THE  FAR  EAST   :«ir, 

was  demonstrating  the  kind  and  variety  of  man-eating 
sharks  which  inhabited  those  waters,  and  ate  the  arms 
and  legs  and  sometimes  the  whole  bodies  of  the  boys 
that  dived  for  us,  as  we  ourselves  had  seen,  there  was  a 
great  splash.  The  Doctor  had  gone. 

Some  anxious  minutes  were  spent  in  fishing  him  out. 
But  he  was  rescued  at  last,  still  minus  the  cane,  but  with 
all  his  limbs  about  him.  Thinking  the  excitement  of 
the  evening  was  now  over,  I  went  to  bed.  But  appar- 
ently some  alcohol  circulated  to  celebrate  the  postpone- 
ment of  the  Doctor's  demise,  for  the  ship  got  noisier  and 
noisier,  and  I  was  awakened  out  of  a  doze  to  hear  the 
stewardess  whispering  in  a  scared  voice  through  my  key- 
hole :  "Is  your  door  locked?  Be  sure  you  keep  it  locked.'' 

Listening  to  the  racket  above,  I  gathered  that  the  Doc- 
tor's boon  companions,  rejoicing  over  his  safety,  and 
rendered  benevolent  by  alcohol,  had  sworn  that  they 
were  all  coming  down  to  call  on  me  and  make  me  treat 
him  nicely,  and  had  actually  started  toward  my  cabin. 
They  were  intercepted  by  the  Cousin,  who  sent  the  stew- 
ardess flying  down  to  warn  me,  and  administered  such 
discipline  as  was  at  the  command  of  a  subordinate  on 
bad  terms  with  his  captain. 

Next  day  I  found  the  Captain  abject.  The  Cousin  had 
lost  no  time  in  explaining  to  him  just  what  kind  of  a  case 
I  had.  No  woman  of  any  dignity  likes  to  use  an  appeal 
against  insult  to  her  sex  as  a  weapon,  but  it  is  always 
well  for  her  to  know  its  force  in  the  laws  and  courts  of 
civilized  nations.  I  held  my  peace  and  let  the  Captain 
apologize  in  fear  and  trembling.  He  was  a  good  little 
duffer,  himself  well-meaning  and  clean-spoken,  but  help- 
less against  rowdies.  Then  I  told  him  just  what  sort  of 
rotters  he  and  his  mates  were  to  allow  such  a  situation 
to  arise.  I  said  that  from  the  first  I  had  been  steadily 


396  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

victimized  in  favour  of  women  whose  character  was  now 
sufficiently  obvious.  I  added  that  I  expected  him  as 
Captain  not  merely  to  see  that  I  was  let  alone  in  person, 
but  to  suppress  the  kind  of  scandalous  talk  that  went  on 
aboard,  at  least  so  far  as  it  concerned  me,  since  this  ulti- 
mately led  to  the  kind  of  thing  which  had  happened  last 
night.  Whereupon  he  lifted  his  bland  blue  eyes  with  the 
innocence  of  an  ingenue  of  thirteen  and  said  helplessly : 
"But  what  can  I  do?" 

"Do?"  I  thought  bitterly.  "Pray  Heaven  for  a  new 
set  of  brains." 

At  this  point  we  were  happily  interrupted  by  the  ar- 
rival of  a  new  delegation  of  passengers,  most  of  whom 
were  missionaries.  Seeing  the  ship  fall  at  once  and  com- 
pletely into  their  possession,  I  decided  that  I  would  con- 
tinue to  try  my  fortunes  on  board.  Within  a  few  hours 
the  place  had  undergone  a  complete  moral  disinfection. 
The  scandals  sank  out  of  sight,  and  one  felt  a  noticeable 
improvement  in  the  quality  of  the  whisperings.  The 
missionaries  were  a  kind  of  closed  corporation,  inter- 
ested only  in  their  own  affairs  and  observances,  but  they 
brought  wives  and  children  and  a  wholesome  family 
life ;  and  against  the  solid  front  which  they  presented  to 
the  world,  the  rowdies  could  not  prevail. 

As  we  headed  out  into  the  Arabian  sea,  I  felt  as  lone- 
some as  ever,  but  comfortable  and  at  peace.  Eight  days 
of  heat  and  seasickness  and  changeless  blue  water 
brought  us  to  the  entrance  of  the  Ked  Sea.  Here  we 
were  held  up  because  the  Turks,  in  an  absent-minded  mo- 
ment, had  forgotten  that  the  war  was  over,  and  had  fired 
upon  a  transport  which  had  gone  before  us.  No  satis- 
faction being  obtained  from  Constantinople  by  cable, 
some  British  Tommies  had  been  procured,  who  went  be- 
fore us  and  dealt  out  summary  justice.  It  was  soon  re- 


AT  THE  GATES  OF  THE  FAR  EAST   397 

ported  that  the  enemy  was  in  flight  and  we  might  pro- 
ceed. 

So  toward  sunset  on  Christmas  Eve  we  sailed  out  into 
the  Red  Sea,  and  awoke  on  Christmas  morning  to  find 
the  low  hills  of  Egypt  to  our  right,  and,  to  the  left,  the 
barren  and  shining  wilderness  in  which  the  Children  of 
Israel  had  wandered  for  forty  years.  Looking  upon 
those  wastes  of  gleaming  sand  and  desert  rock,  I  under- 
stood why  these  pilgrims  cried  out  for  the  fleshpots  of 
Egypt,  or  at  most  for  a  spring  of  sweet  water.  There 
are  places  on  the  earth  where  three  drops  of  dew  and 
the  light  of  a  lonely  blossom  have  the  power  to  make 
paradise. 

Meanwhile  we  were  trying  to  celebrate  Christmas  as 
best  we  might.  Our  missionaries  had  some  pretty  kid- 
dies among  them  who  had  had  little  opportunity  to  en- 
joy the  holidays  of  childhood.  When  I  reached  home  at 
last  the  first  magazine  I  bought  explained  the  history  of 
these  little  ones,  but  left  the  tale  half  told.  They  were 
part  of  the  company  under  the  leadership  of  the  "Yan- 
kee Cadi."  The  Yankee  Cadi  was  a  missionary  doctor, 
who,  caught  on  the  borders  between  Persia  and  Russia, 
in  the  terrible  outlying  chaos  of  the  war,  had  put  up  the 
American  flag,  and  declared  himself  the  American  con- 
sul. By  sheer  force  of  the  American  name  and  his  pos- 
session of  supplies  from  the  American  relief,  he  had 
maintained  peace  and  administered  justice  in  the  midst 
of  wild  and  brutal  conflicts  of  Turks  and  Kurds.  In 
the  magazine  his  story  was  left  so.  He  was  still  hold- 
ing out.  But  I  knew  the  rest.  For  he  had  died  at  last, 
and  his  company  had  fled,  seven  months  overland,  to 
find  the  British  forces.  And  this  little  group  of  women, 
with  their  children,  and  without  the  escort  of  a  man, 
were  some  who  had  come  to  safety  within  the  British 


398  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

lines  in  Mesopotamia  and  had  been  transferred  through 
India  to  our  ship. 

There  was  not  much  we  could  do  for  the  children. 
Our  supplies  were  beginning  to  suffer  from  the  heat  and 
the  long  runs  between  ports,  and  became  daily  less  tol- 
erable, and  Christmas  trees  do  not  grow  on  the  hills  of 
Egypt  or  in  the  wilderness  of  Sinai.  But  the  old  Doc- 
tor dressed  himself  up  in  a  beard  and  wig  of  white  cot- 
ton batting  and  an  astonishing  scarlet  costume  and 
went  about  distributing  little  things.  Then  we  all  had 
a  Christmas  entertainment  in  the  social  hall,  and  the 
children  spoke  "pieces"  in  which  Santa  Claus  and  gentle 
Jesus  were  gloriously  mixed.  On  this  occasion  an  or- 
chestra composed  of  the  piano,  tissue  paper  and  combs, 
two  tin  pans  by  way  of  cymbals,  and  a  red  tin  horn, 
officiated.  For  a  time  all  our  feuds  and  scandals  were 
forgotten ;  Circe  emerged  and  played  the  piano ;  Medea 
attended  in  state;  and  the  drunken  Doctor,  as  Santa 
Claus,  was  almost  a  hero. 

Next  day,  at  dawn,  I  looked  forth  to  see  ourselves 
sliding  easily  through  the  midst  of  the  desert,  as  if  our 
ship  had  suddenly  grown  wheels  and  taken  to  a  career 
on  dry  land.  We  were  in  the  Suez  Canal.  Through 
my  porthole  I  could  see  the  desert  rolling  away,  in  hills, 
and  hummocks,  and  unfinished  heaps  of  sand,  copper- 
coloured  in  the  light  of  the  morning,  till  it  lost  itself  in 
the  blue  distance  as  in  the  waves  of  a  tossing  sea.  When 
I  came  on  deck,  the  air  that  greeted  me  was  soft  and 
spring-like  and  a  little  cool. 

There  was  a  strange  peace  and  intimacy  in  the  sudden 
nearness  to  earth.  Noiselessly  the  boat  slipped  along, 
and  on  both  sides  the  land  was  so  close  that  we  could 
hold  conversation  as  we  passed  with  men  in  the  little 
shacks  on  shore.  It  was  an  empty  and  barren  country, 


AT  THE  GATES  OF  THE  FAR  EAST   :«W 

pure  desert  in  the  distance  and  decorated,  near  at  hand, 
only  with  casual  and  temporary  buildings  and  a  little 
discouraged  looking  vegetation.  Here  and  there  we 
could  see  the  remains  of  trenches  and  even  of  rusting 
helmets  and  other  military  gear,  for  all  this  had  re- 
cently been  a  scene  of  fighting  between  the  British  and 
the  Turks.  The  Captain  said  that  on  his  last  trip  he  had 
seen  the  waters  dyed  red  with  the  blood  of  Turks,  and 
had  distributed  cigarettes  to  fighting  Tommies  who 
swam  out  under  the  fire  of  the  enemy  to  get  them.  As 
we  went  on,  we  found  the  banks  still  held  by  British 
forces,  and  our  passage  became  a  triumphal  march  like 
that  of  the  returning  soldiers  down  Fifth  Avenue.  For 
we  were  the  first  women  and  children  who  had  come 
through  for  eighteen  months,  and  the  men  rushed  down 
to  the  shore  to  wave  to  us,  and  throw  kisses  to  the  little 
ones. 

So  we  travelled  on  all  day,  amid  smiles  and  greetings 
and  kisses  blown  to  us  on  the  sunshine,  till  at  evening 
we  came  out  into  the  Mediterranean  in  a  blaze  of  sand 
and  sea  and  yellow  sunset,  and  the  gates  of  the  Far  East 
closed  upon  us. 


CHAPTER  L 

"PEACE  ON  EARTH  ;  GOOD  WILL  TO  MEN" 

WHEN  we  sailed  into  the  Red  Sea,  and  I  saw  Egypt  on 
one  side  and  Arabia  on  the  other,  I  felt  as  if  I  were 
sailing  straight  into  the  fables  of  my  childhood.  I  half 
expected  the  Arabian  Nights  and  my  Sunday-school  les- 
sons to  materialize  at  once  and  come  right  along  with 
me.  The  faith  of  man  is  indeed  weak.  I  perceive  that 
I  never  really  did  believe  that  there  was  a  Red  Sea.  I 
looked  upon  it  as  merely  a  place  in  the  Bible,  like  the 
heavenly  Jerusalem. 

But  if  I  had  some  difficulty  in  attaching  to  that  re- 
splendent stretch  of  blue  water  a  reality  outside  the 
world  of  the  storybook,  I  was  really  put  to  it  when  I 
came  into  Port  Said.  Port  Said  in  itself  has  nothing  of 
romance  about  it.  It  is  a  commonplace,  dingy,  ram- 
shackle old  town,  though  at  the  moment  of  our  entering 
it  was  set  against  a  background  of  flaming  sunset.  One 
might  match  it  almost  anywhere  in  the  world — so  non- 
descript it  is,  without  feature  or  distinction  or  dignity  of 
any  kind.  And  yet  this  junk-heap  among  cities,  this 
backwash  of  all  the  human  debris  of  the  Mediterranean, 
is  the  meeting-place  of  half  the  world,  the  gateway  of 
the  Far  East  and  the  terminus  of  routes  into  many  lands 
endeared  by  song  and  story.  Palestine,  Turkey,  Arabia, 
Egypt,  Greece,  Italy — all  pour  their  wares  and  their 
peoples  into  this  port.  The  pyramids  and  the  tombs  of 
the  Pharaohs  are  just  around  the  corner ;  the  way  of  the 
cross  and  the  place  of  the  manger  are  not  far  beyond. 

400 


"PEACE  ON  EARTH"  401 

News  of  Bagdad  and  Jerusalem,  of  Rome  and  Athens, 
circulates  freely  in  the  street  gossip.  Ilere  one  walks 
about  environed  by  myth  and  escorted  by  history. 

And  at  that  moment,  when  on  Christmas  night  we 
steamed  into  Port  Said,  we  came  into  a  scene  that  will 
be  history  as  long  as  men  remember.  The  Christmas 
stars  were  lovely  above  the  vulgar  old  town  on  that  shin- 
ing night.  Never,  perhaps,  since  the  angels  sang  "Peace 
on  Earth,  good  will  to  men,"  have  the  stars  of  Christ's 
own  country  looked  down  on  men  who  so  poignantly  un- 
derstood the  meaning  of  the  benediction.  For  here, 
where  the  dearest  memories  of  the  world  meet  and 
mingle,  there  was  at  Christmas  time  a  meeting  of  many 
men  and  many  ships.  Six  weeks  after  the  signing  of 
the  armistice,  the  news  had  had  time  to  reach  all  those 
little  groups  of  men  in  desert  and  jungle  who  had  been 
fighting  unheralded  and  forgotten  battles.  To  the  bor- 
ders of  Persia,  to  the  northwestern  frontiers  of  India, 
to  the  jungles  of  Africa,  the  word  had  somehow  gone 
forth,  and  weary  men  laid  down  their  arms  and 
straggled  back  to  civilization.  To  Port  Sai'd  on  that 
Christmas  the  sand,  the  sea,  and  the  savage  hills  of  Asia 
gave  up  their  dead.  Men  who  had  not  been  heard  of  for 
years  came  back  as  from  the  grave.  Sometimes  they 
came  like  the  messenger  to  Job :  "And  I  only  am  escaped 
to  tell  thee." 

All  day  long  the  ships  were  coming  in  from  the  ends 
of  the  earth,  battered  but  triumphant,  limping  in  with 
broken  bows  and  flying  flags  to  the  music  of  welcoming 
whistles  on  every  side.  And  we,  in  our  disreputable 
little  bark,  the  first  to  come  through  from  India  bearing 
women  and  children,  found  ourselves  but  one  in  a  great 
and  jubilant  host.  As  we  steamed  in,  in  the  twilight, 
all  the  harbour  was  glad  with  reunions  on  every  deck. 


402  I^s   THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

As  we  came  to  anchor,  a  bright-faced  young  man  in  a 
Red  Cross  uniform  came  up  the  side  of  our  ship.  He 
was  from  Bethlehem,  he  said,  and  thought  we  might  like 
some  news.  So,  perching  on  the  rail,  he  distributed  bits 
of  information  about  this  one  and  that  rescued  from 
Turkish  dungeons ;  another  dead,  perhaps,  after  some 
terrible  suffering;  some  still  in  the  hands  of  brigands. 
He  was  soon  joined  by  a  blue-eyed  man  whose  face 
seemed  younger  than  his  white  hair.  He  was  a  Ca- 
nadian who  had  spent  most  of  his  last  years  in  captivity 
among  the  Turks.  At  first  he  had  been  simply  in- 
terned, but,  after  being 'released  from  that  confinement, 
he  had  joined  the  Armenian  relief.  So  the  next  time 
the  Turks  got  him,  they  put  him  in  prison.  He  was 
now  to  return  with  us,  as  an  exchanged  prisoner  of  war. 

Even  as  we  talked  of  these  matters,  and  watched  and 
speculated  upon  the  meetings  in  the  ships  around  us, 
and  all  the  coming  and  going  in  the  harbour,  a  hush  fell 
upon  the  hilarious  bustle.  Another  ship  had  come — a 
white  ship  of  the  Eed  Cross  laden  with  convalescent 
wounded.  The  invalids  were  all  out  on  the  decks,  cheer- 
ing and  chaffing  near-by  ships,  as  they  came  in;  but  in 
the  eyes  of  the  onlookers  there  seemed  suddenly  no 
heart  for  laughter.  It  may  be  that  their  hearts  were 
too  tender  with  the  experience  of  many  reunions — too 
sore,  as  yet,  with  fear  and  doubt.  It  was  in  silence,  in  a 
kind  of  poignant  reverence,  that  men  watched  the  snowy 
ship  come  in.  Beautiful  as  an  angel  she  seemed,  pure, 
gracious,  and  triumphant,  gliding  into  the  midst  of  that 
great  rejoicing,  bearing  safe  in  her  arms  the  lives  of 
men  snatched  from  destruction.  Night  fell,  and  in  the 
darkness,  beneath  the  stars  of  Christmas,  she  seemed  to 
brood  upon  the  waters  like  a  great  white  dove.  But 
some  time  in  the  early  dawn  she  stole  away;  nor  could 


"  PEACE  ON  EARTH  "  403 

we  tell  whence  she  had  come  and  whither  she  had  gone. 

Next  morning  looked  like  old  home  week  in  Port  Said. 
Every  street  corner  held  a  congratulatory  group. 
Everywhere  the  barriers  between  man  and  man,  nation 
and  nation,  were  down.  Every  one  was  disposed  to  talk, 
and  the  tiresome  formalities  of  passport  offices  and  cus- 
toms became  social  occasions.  As  Americans  we  were 
greeted  with  special  pleasure,  for,  in  those  days,  America 
was  still  the  saviour  of  war-wrecked  Europe,  and  went 
haloed  with  grateful  and  wistful  regard.  A  young  sol- 
dier, more  or  less  French,  who  looked  at  my  pass  re- 
marked, "American?  It  is  nice  to  see  you  here."  A 
distinguished-looking  Armenian  with  melancholy  eyes, 
who  spoke  English  meticulously,  like  a  professor,  re- 
marked :  "You  are  American !  Ah — that  is  a  fine  coun- 
try— America.  I  hope  one  day  to  be  myself  an  Ameri- 
can." When  we  returned,  he  again  bowed  and  waved 
farewell.  "I  hope  you  will  be  happy  in  America,"  he 
said  wistfully. 

Throughout  the  town  the  shabby  little  streets  were 
scenes  of  international  amity  and  rejoicing,  full  of  men 
intent  on  the  business  of  peace  after  the  long  days  of 
war.  Big  Australians,  in  their  picturesque  broad  hats, 
came  blustering  down  the  centre  of  the  thoroughfares. 
The  topknots  of  French  sailors  gaily  speckled  the  crowd. 
Italians  drank  red  wine  in  little  open-air  cafe's.  And 
here  and  there  a  British  Tommy  lingered  in  the  shops, 
choosing  for  his  girl  at  home  a  souvenir  of  the  pyramids 
and  the  desert,  little  images  of  Moses  in  the  bullrushes, 
perhaps,  or  the  form  of  the  suffering  Christ  cut  out  of 
olive  wood  from  Jerusalem. 

And  amid  these  men  so  sure  of  their  nationality,  so 
proudly  hall-marked  with  their  place  among  great  and 
haughty  nations,  there  moved  others,  confused,  wonder- 


404  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

ing,  stammering  over  the  records  of  their  countries  and 
even  of  their  very  names.  These  were  peoples  of  Eastern 
Europe,  members  of  minor  nationalities  under  Turkish 
or  Russian  rule,  men  who  felt  that  the  war  had  made 
them  free,  yet  who  scarcely  knew  where  they  were  at 
liberty  to  attach  themselves,  or  what  land  and  govern- 
ment they  might  legitimately  claim.  An  old  man,  blind 
in  the  right  eye,  and  lame  in  the  left  leg,  came  hobbling 
into  the  passport  office,  under  the  escort  of  a  small  boy. 

"Of  what  government  are  you  a  subject?"  asked  the 
official. 

"I  am  the  subject  of  no  government,"  answered  the 
old  man  proudly.  "I  am  a  free  man." 

"Yes,  yes,"  answered  the  official  impatiently.  "So  are 
we  all,  but  we  belong  to  states  nevertheless.  Some  gov- 
ernment must  be  responsible  for  you.  Oh,  I  see" — look- 
ing at  his  pass — "this  is  Turkish  insignia.  Are  you  a 
Turk?" 

"My  people  were  long  oppressed  by  the  Turks,"  re- 
plied the  old  man.  "But  now  they  are  free.  I  am  an 
Armenian." 

And  one-eyed  and  lame  of  leg  as  he  was,  he  stood  there 
with  the  dignity  of  a  very  herald  of  liberty,  and  the  fer- 
vency of  this  announcement  stirred  all  the  jejune  atmos- 
phere with  a  momentary  sense  of  the  drama  of  states 
and  peoples. 

Meanwhile  through  all  the  town  and  the  harbour  there 
were  reunions.  Wives  in  the  arms  of  their  husbands; 
sweethearts  a  little  strained  and  shy  after  so  long  a  sep- 
aration; brothers  and  sisters  trying  to  chaff  each  other 
and  not  to  act  like  strangers;  and  mothers  openly, 
shamelessly  weeping  on  the  shoulders  of  joyous,  embar- 
rassed sons.  It  made  the  lonely  ones  feel  more  lonely. 

As  I  stood  on  our  deck,  watching  these  scenes  aboard 


"  PEACE  ON  EARTH  "  405 

our  nearest  neighbour,  with  just  a  little  wistfulness  in 
my  own  heart,  a  burring  voice  asked, 

"Lassie,  be  ye  spliced?" 

"No,"  said  I,  turning  in  astonishment. 

"Neither  am  I,  thank  God." 

I  surveyed  the  perpetrator  of  this  announcement  in 
amazement.  He  was  a  pallid,  dazed-looking  individual, 
in  a  shabby  blue  uniform,  with  the  shuffling  gait  and  un- 
certain movements  of  one  who  has  risen  from  a  long 
illness.  He  spoke  with  the  voice  and  accent  and  vocabu- 
lary of  a  northern  Englishman.  He  continued : 

"I  should  be  spliced  now,  only  my  girl  married  a 
schoolmaster.  I  went  to  war,  and  he  stayed  at  home. 
So  he  got  her.  Thank  God  he  did !  Thank  God  he  did." 

And  he  went  away  murmuring. 

Afterward,  as  I  walked  around  the  deck,  I  ran  into 
two  others  in  the  same  uniform — two  gnarled,  knobby 
and  ghoulish  beings,  with  only  a  kind  of  memory  of 
manhood  about  them.  Just  then  the  Cousin,  blowing 
past,  remarked: 

"See  them?    D.  B.  S.  they  are." 

"And  what,"  I  asked,  "is  a  D.  B.  S.?" 

"Distressed  British  Seaman.  All  that's  left  of  many 
a  good  ship.  They  are  washed  up  all  along  these  shores, 
more  dead  than  alive,  and  mostly  soft  in  the  head." 

"Yes,  I  met  one  like  that." 

"I  know.  Hero  of  the  Dardanelles,  too.  A  shell 
landed  on  his  deck,  and  he  threw  it  overboard  before  it 
exploded.  But  his  cerebrum  and  cerebellum  are  now 
exploded  too."  And  he  went  away,  tapping  his  forehead 
with  cheerful  vulgarity. 

We  stayed  in  Port  Said  only  long  enough  to  rejuvenate 
our  food  a  trifle,  and  to  acquire  some  small  bitter 
oranges.  Little  of  the  real  Egypt  came  to  us  there — 


406  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

only  whiffs  and  scents  of  the  life  beyond,  echoes  of  old 
stories,  an  environment  of  wonder,  unseen,  intangible. 
Gradually,  as  I  walked  about,  a  vision  of  a  world  great 
and  strange  and  very  old  which  lay  just  beyond,  took 
possession  of  me,  till  I  felt  as  if,  in  some  sense,  I  di  L 
know  Egypt,  as  I  felt  that  I  knew  the  Himalayas, 
though  I  saw  only  the  clouds  behind  which  they  shone. 

But  our  sojourn  at  Port  Said  allowed  only  for  imag- 
inary contacts.  Suddenly,  without  warning,  we  were 
ordered  on  board,  and  within  an  hour  were  out  again, 
skimming  along  over  glittering  blue  water.  The  poisqn- 
ous  sunlight  of  the  tropics  was  gone.  We  breathed  again 
the  ozone  of  the  clean  Western  World.  Soft  and  cool, 
with  a  spring-like  freshness,  the  winds  of  the  lovely 
Mediterranean  winter  blew  to  us  over  the  sunny  sea. 

So  we  slipped  along  over  the  path  by  which  long  ago 
the  Boman  galleys,  and  the  trading  ships  of  the  Greeks, 
went  to  and  fro,  and  where  later  the  Moorish  pirates 
used  to  lie  in  wait  for  the  ships  bearing  perfumes  and 
spices  and  silks  from  the  gorgeous  East  to  some  mer- 
chant of  Venice  or  grandee  of  Genoa.  At  noon  we 
passed  the  island  of  Malta,  where  St.  Paul  was  ship- 
wrecked, gleaming  silvery  and  pearly  blue  above  the 
sheen  of  the  waters.  Though  there  were  rumours  aboard 
of  possible  stops  along  the  North  African  coast,  at  Tunis 
or  Algiers,  the  ship  kept  steadily  on.  But  standing  on 
deck,  in  the  cool  sunset,  I  would  sometimes  think  of 
the  romantic  coast  which  lay  just  beyond  the  rim  of 
waters,  where  modern  France  has  settled  down  like  a 
fringe  on  the  desert,  and  sends  her  automobiles  whizzing 
along  under  the  very  nose  of  the  astonished  camel. 

Beyond  the  olive  orchards  and  vineyards,  I  knew,  was 
that  infinite  ocean  of  sand  which  I  had  seen  for  but  a 
moment,  unique  in  its  brilliance  and  its  loneliness.  And 


f  I 


©  Otto  ('.  <;ilinon 


The  solemn  figure  of  the  Bedouin  lifts  up  his  hands  in  prayer 

to  Allah 


"  PEACE  ON  EARTH  "  407 

there,  in  the  lonely  glow  of  the  desert,  the  solemn  figure 
of  the  Bedouin  may  be  seen,  dark  against  the  sunset  sky, 
as  he  lifts  up  his  hands  in  prayer  to  Allah.  For  all  the 
coast  of  North  Africa  is,  in  its  way,  a  land  as  marvellous 
as  Egypt,  the  tomb  and  mausoleum  of  a  glorious  past. 
Once  it  was  the  granary  of  the  Roman  empire,  and  a 
centre  of  the  Latin  church  in  the  days  of  its  first  glory. 
Now  the  daisies  and  almond  trees  are  blooming  among 
the  delicate  ruined  columns  and  tiled  baths  of  the  days 
of  Roman  luxury.  And  where  Tertullian  and  Augustine 
once  dreamed  of  conquering  the  world  for  Christ,  the 
wild  Arab  boy  now  gathers  narcissus,  unchallenged  and 
untaught 

So  I  would  think  as  I  stood  on  deck,  trying  to  pierce 
the  veil  of  shining  light  that  was  between  us  and  those 
storied  shores.  Meanwhile  our  social  situation  had 
somewhat  improved,  through  the  vanishing  of  Circe  at 
Port  Said  and  the  accession  of  some  members  of  the 
Red  Cross  and  our  exchanged  prisoner  of  war,  who  had 
been  a  missionary  doctor.  By  dint  of  steadily  throw- 
ing myself  at  his  head,  I  had  made  friends  with  N.  B., 
whom  I  may  henceforth  call  Fred.  I  think  he  looked 
upon  me  as  a  designing  female,  and  stood  in  mortal  ter- 
ror of  the  gossip  which  on  shipboard  pursued  the  most 
innocent  companionship.  Though  he  was  still  a  simple 
youth,  full  of  little  boyish  mannerisms,  I  began,  in  the 
close  contacts  of  the  ship,  to  appreciate  in  him  the  com- 
plexity and  fine  texture  of  character  of  a  gentleman, 
born  and  bred  of  gentlemen. 

I  found  some  temporary  occupation  for  my  idle  mind 
and  heart  in  the  growth  of  this  friendship,  which  did 
something  to  preserve  my  faith,  for  the  time,  in  men 
and  the  goodness  of  human  life.  For  the  rest,  life  had 
hardly  become  amusing,  though  the  society  was  less  ob- 


408  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

noxious.  Our  old  D.  B.  S.  insisted  on  occupying  the 
centre  of  the  stage  as  a  kind  of  unconscious  clown,  too 
pitiful  to  be  amusing.  Seventeen  times  a  day  he  would 
go  about  the  ship  and  solemnly  congratulate  those  who 
were  not  married,  and  condole  with  those  who  were,  re- 
peating to  each,  in  almost  the  same  words,  the  story  of 
his  jilting.  There  was  no  turning  him  from  the  topic. 
It  was  as  if  the  shock  which  had  carried  away  the  rest 
of  his  mind  and  recollection  had  left  this  one  memory 
which  clung  too  deeply  to  be  torn  away,  left  it  exposed, 
without  any  covering  of  consciousness,  to  the  world. 

Apart  from  the  shattered  romance  of  the  old  D.  B.  S. 
and  reminiscences  among  the  Red  Cross  of  the  exploits 
of  Allenby  in  Palestine,  there  wTas  nothing  new  to  amuse 
us  on  board,  no  resuscitation,  even,  of  our  old  troubles. 
The  voice  of  slander  had  sunk  to  a  whisper,  and  our 
scandals  slunk  round  the  decks  belowr.  Only  the  first 
engineer  varied  the  monotony  by  falling  in  love  with  a 
lady  missionary,  who  was  a  sweet  soul  and  liked  to  be 
a  sister  to  young  men,  in  order  to  keep  them  from  fall- 
ing into  evil  courses.  The  customary  mystery  about  our 
destination  still  obtained,  though  it  was  plain  that  if 
we  were  to  get  out  of  the  Mediterranean,  we  should  have 
to  stop  at  Gibraltar.  The  ship's  officers,  in  fact,  were 
much  occupied  with  the  problem  of  coal.  We  could  not 
risk  the  Atlantic  journey  without  more  fuel.  Suppose 
there  was  no  coal  for  us  at  Gibraltar!  Where  could 
we  go  to  get  it,  without  the  danger  of  running  short  en 
route?  As  for  me,  I  began  to  feel  as  if  I  had  been  born 
and  brought  up  on  that  ship,  and  all  memory  of  life  on 
land  was  but  a  dream  and  bright  illusion. 

Outside  of  Gibraltar  we  encountered  a  little  excite- 
ment in  the  shape  of  our  first  real  storm.  For  a  day  and 
a  half  we  steamed  against  the  mountainous  waves  and 


"  PEACE  ON  EARTH  "  400 

moved  onward  not  a  step.  The  bow  was  battered  to 
pieces,  and  the  whole  ship  quaked  and  shivered.  Then 
suddenly  one  morning  we  awoke  to  find  peace  upon  the 
grey  waters,  and  the  outlines  of  snowy  mountain  heights 
emerging  against  the  grey  mist,  like  painted  forms 
upon  a  curtain.  Spain! 


CHAPTER  LI 

THE  ROAD  TO  THE  ALHAMBRA 

Nor  till  evening  did  we  come  under  the  shadow  of 
that  mighty  rock,  and  see  it,  sombre  and  grandiose 
against  the  blossoming  stars,  atwinkle  with  lights  and 
shaking  with  the  thunder  of  its  guns.  One  more  mag- 
nificent seat  for  that  great  mistress  of  the  waters  who 
has  known  how  to  entrench  herself  beside  the  sea,  on 
many  thrones,  from  the  grey,  mist-crowned  heights  of 
Hongkong  to  the  chalky  cliffs  of  Dover — a  thing  unique 
in  nature,  and  singular  in  its  acquired  majesty  and 
power.  All  night  we  lay  beneath  that  splendid  shadow. 
But  early  next  morning  I  was  awakened,  not  only  by  a 
volley  from  British  guns,  but  by  the  strains  of  "The 
Star  Spangled  Banner."  For  a  moment  it  was  to  me  a 
dream — all  this  alien  world  in  which  I  had  been  so  long 
a  wanderer.  I  half  believed  that  I  was  only  awaking 
again  on  the  shores  of  the  Hudson,  where  the  battle- 
ships at  anchor  used  to  salute  the  morning  in  the  days 
which  now  seemed  to  me  so  long  foregone. 

When  I  ran  up  on  deck,  I  found  all  my  fellow-pas- 
sengers divided  between  an  exchange  of  joyful  courtesies 
with  an  American  battleship  next  to  us,  and  an  attempt 
to  see  in  the  great  rock  which  now  towered  and  glistened 
athwart  the  morning,  the  profile  which  a  life  insurance 
company  has  made  so  familiar.  But  I  was  busy  with 
delighted  contemplation  of  the  trim  blue  figures  drilling 
aboard  our  neighbour.  Every  one  of  them  an  Ameri- 
can !  How  wonderful  it  seemed ! 

410 


THE  ROAD  TO  THE  ALHAMBRA    411 

A  few  minutes  later,  after  the  most  perfunctory  re- 
spects to  our  breakfast,  we  were  gliding  to  the  foot,  of 
the  rock  in  a  launch,  right  under  the  noses  of  the  Ameri- 
cans, among  whom  some  relaxation  of  naval  rigour  al- 
lowed an  exchange  of  greetings  with  us,  in  accents  de- 
liciously  Yankee.  They  were  going  in  a  few  minutes, 
they  said,  and  even  before  we  returned,  we  saw  them 
pull  out  and  steer  into  the  Atlantic.  But  we  had  landed 
at  the  shabby  little  town  of  Gibraltar,  and  were  already 
rejoicing  in  the  sweet  April  coolness  of  a  winter  that  is 
only  one  long  spring,  and  buying  hyacinths  and  narcis- 
sus fresh  with  the  dews  of  the  hills  of  Spain.  No  one 
who  has  seen  how  these  flowers,  which  are  among  us  hot- 
house darlings,  grow  wild  and  hardy  in  every  neglected 
place  along  the  Mediterranean,  inhabiting  even  the 
roofless  sites  of  old  palaces,  can  help  breathing  there- 
after, in  their  thick  perfume,  a  kind  of  distillation  of 
dreams  and  old  romance. 

Apart  from  the  street  bouquets  that  breathe  of  more 
fertile  fields,  Gibraltar  is  itself  almost  as  barren  as  the 
sea.  It  is  an  enormous  mountain  of  naked  rock,  rising 
sheer  out  of  the  ocean,  covered  only  with  the  fortifica- 
tions of  the  British  who  have  tunnelled  deep  into  its 
heart,  and  planted  with  guns  at  every  angle.  At  its 
foot  clings  a  little  town  half  Spanish,  half  international, 
with  streets  that  resemble  nothing  so  much  in  their  daily 
life  as  some  of  the  streets  of  the  lower  East  Side  in 
New  York.  All  the  typical  characters  are  there — women 
with  black  shawls  over  their  heads,  men  with  curly 
black  beards,  and  dirty,  dark-eyed  babies — and  they 
preside  over  the  same  kind  of  shabby  cosmopolitan  little 
shops.  Only  is  one  reminded  that  this  is  Spain  by  the 
presence  of  rickety  carriages  painted  in  scarlet  and 
yellow. 


412  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

In  one  of  these  we  set  forth  to  drive  around  the  road 
which  ascends  the  rock  spiralwise.  It  was  a  bright 
morning.  The  full  white  clouds  blew  through  the  deep 
blue  sky  like  sails  of  ships  upon  the  sea.  To  the  one  side 
we  saw  the  coasts  of  Morocco, — a  wall,  as  it  seemed,  be- 
fore the  impenetrable  heart  of  Africa, — a  fairy  blue 
shore,  delicate,  glistening.  Thence,  in  the  old  days,  came 
the  terrible  hordes  of  the  Moors,  to  enter  into  and  possess 
the  orange-clad  slopes  of  Andalusia.  On  the  other  side, 
the  mountains  of  Spain  uplifted  into  the  blaze  of  the 
morning  their  crowns  of  winter  snow. 

After  breathing  the  ozone  of  those  rocky  heights  and 
dazzling  our  eyes  with  the  wide  landscape  so  radiant 
with  the  light  of  sky  and  sea,  we  ventured  across  the 
border  into  Spanish  territory,  and  became  spectacles  for 
the  edification  of  a  shabby  little  town  whose  faded  pink 
and  blue  and  yellow  buildings  were  coloured  like  the 
remnants  of  last  summer's  wardrode.  On  the  border  we 
were  greeted  by  a  pompous  soldier  in  the  complete  re- 
galia of  the  days  before  1914,  when  war  was  still  a 
pageant  and  a  pastime  for  gentlemen.  In  his  long  grey- 
blue  breeches  and  tight  coat  and  helmet,  and  all  his 
trappings  of  silver  and  scarlet,  he  was  the  most  orna- 
mental thing  on  the  landscape — the  only  thing,  indeed, 
which  did  not  look  shabby  and  dusty,  like  the  contents 
of  a  pawnshop.  He  let  us  pass  with  a  flourish.  After 
wandering  rather  forlornly,  we  returned  the  richer  by 
two  terrible  spikes  crusted  with  blood  from  the  last 
bullfight  thereabouts,  which  were  sold  to  us  for  the  price 
of  several  bunches  of  hyacinths.  Finally  we  made  our 
way  back  to  the  hotel,  where  we  dined  sumptuously  on 
very  white  bread,  very  black  coffee,  and  unlimited  hors 
d'ceuvres. 

This  was  all.    There  was  nothing  else  to  see  or  do  in 


'V  X 


THE   ROAD  TO   THE  ALHAMBRA          4i:>> 

Gibraltar,  though  Fred  did  report  a  movie.  Life 
dragged.  Then  came  something  worse  than  ennui.  The 
Captain  announced  that  we  were  stranded  here  indefi- 
nitely without  coal.  Thereupon  we  suggested  that  we 
start  off  in  search  of  the  Alhambra.  Fred  was  prepared 
to  be  any  kind  of  wandering  troubadour  in  the  moun- 
tains, and  he  and  I,  having  long  since  pooled  the  scanty 
remains  of  our  cash — the  remains  being  mostly  his — felt 
committed  to  the  protection  of  each  other.  Every  day 
we  discussed  what  we  would  do  if  the  ship  should  dump 
us  here.  "I  will  sell  newspapers,  and  you  will  write 
them,"  he  would  say.  "Thus  we  may  eke  out  a  romantic 
existence." 

These  were  but  flutters  of  fancy  to  divert  my  mind 
from  graver  matters.  I  had  plenty  of  cause  for  private 
pessimism.  I  was  pouring  letters  into  the  wide  seas 
that  lay  between  me  and  Japan,  and  naturally  obtaining 
no  answer  of  any  sort,  no  assurance  that  they  had  found 
their  way  around  the  troubled  world.  It  is  hard  for 
hope  to  subsist  only  on  memory.  And  all  this  time,  as  I 
discovered  when  I  got  to  New  York,  a  cable  was  pur- 
suing me,  telling  me  to  go  to  London  and  providing 
further  funds.  So  I  missed  an  opportunity  to  add  one 
more  chapter  to  my  adventures,  and  to  go  home  at  last 
like  a  lady. 

At  last  our  old  soaks  on  board  took  matters  into  their 
hands  and  made  an  illicit  excursion  into  the  mountains 
of  Spain,  returning  with  suitcases  full  of  red  and  white 
wine,  for  which  apparently  they  had  exchanged  the  last 
remnants  of  their  wits,  and  singing  the  praises  of  a  town 
called  Rondo,  which,  they  averred,  was  the  very  Para- 
dise of  Omar.  Whether  it  was  the  genial  influence  of 
these  medicinal  waters,  I  cannot  tell,  but  the  Captain 
relented  and  said  that  we  too  might  go  to  Rondo  but  no 


414  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

further.  So  to  Eondo  we  set  forth,  Fred  and  I,  with  the 
chaperonage  of  the  Eed  Cross  and  others.  Strict  tee- 
totallers were  we,  but  not  uninterested  in  Eondo,  for  is 
not  that  fair  mountain  fortress  upon  the  road  to  the  Al- 
fa ambra? 

It  was  our  first  real  release  after  forty  days  or  more 
at  sea,  and  we  gambolled  like  school  children  as  our 
little  railway  carriage  climbed  into  the  mountains. 
The  air  was  cool  as  in  very  early  spring,  but  the  laden 
orange  trees  were  gorgeous  and  golden,  and  the  fields 
gay  with  narcissuses. 

About  one  o'clock  we  came  into  a  town  that  overlooked 
a  very  deep  gorge  filled  with  shadows  of  noon-day  blue 
and  decorated  by  a  river  which  coiled  and  sparkled  like 
a  silver  ribbon  dropped  from  on  high.  After  a  luncheon 
at  which  we  refused  the  draughts  of  Omar  in  favour  of 
food  which  might  have  tempted  even  that  old  epicure, 
we  went  out  to  reconnoitre.  Unlike  the  Orient,  whose 
fabled  gorgeousness  one  must  pursue  down  back  alleys 
of  filth  and  unearth  from  such  human  and  animal  debris 
as  no  Occidental  mind,  unaided,  can  conceive,  Spain 
met  at  once  the  illusions  of  fancy.  For  all  the  land 
bore  about  it  an  indescribable  air  of  melancholy  ro- 
mance, of  wild  and  lonely  beauty,  infertile  yet  not 
barren.  It  seemed  like  a  great  man's  house  from  which 
the  master  had  departed,  leaving  it  only  to  servants  and 
caretakers.  We  found  a  little  Moorish  palace  now 
owned  by  a  Spanish  countess — a  series  of  graceful  little 
rooms  with  scalloped  arches  and  roofed  patios,  tiled  in 
blue  and  white,  sunny,  garden-like.  It  had  none  of  the 
splendour,  the  unlimited  luxury,  the  imperial  magnifi- 
cence of  the  Mohammedan  palaces  of  northern  India. 
But  the  architecture  was  similar,  though  on  a  smaller 


THE   ROAD  TO   THE  ALIIAMP.RA          tir, 

scale,  and  it  was  all  delicate,  bright  and  lace-like,  a 
house  for  ladies. 

When  our  party  returned  to  the  hotel,  we  were  met  by 
a  telegram.  The  ship,  it  announced,  had  coal  and  was 
leaving.  The  Captain  would  wait  twelve  hours  for  us 
and  no  longer.  There  was  a  wild  scramble.  The  hotel 
manager  came  to  the  rescue  with  time-table  and  a  lunch, 
which,  it  seemed,  he  had  packed  against  this  emergency, 
having  himself  read  the  telegram  and  surmised  that  we 
could  not  have  dinner  there.  And  thus  ably  seconded, 
we  were  off. 

Off  to  the  station,  that  is.  For  the  train  lived  up  to 
the  reputation  of  the  land  and  did  not  arrive  for  two 
mortal  hours,  which  seemed  at  that  time  a  precious  frac- 
tion of  our  twelve.  The  moon  swept  over  the  hill,  and 
all  the  stars  began  to  glitter,  and  the  night  winds  took 
possession  of  the  silvery  fields.  And  still  the  train  de- 
layed. We  consoled  ourselves  as  best  we  might  with 
the  hotel's  delicious  chicken,  while  I  unearthed  from 
my  unconscious  enough  Spanish  to  ask  for  not  merely 
coffee,  but  coffee  con  leche. 

The  train  came  at  last;  we  piled  into  the  little  rail- 
way carriage,  with  unlimited  oranges  after  us.  And 
to  this  day  that  midnight  career  downward  among  the 
mountains  of  Spain  remains  a  romantic  spot  in  my 
memory.  Outside  the  moonlight  lay  on  the  hills  like 
snow,  and  we  could  see  the  orange  trees,  their  golden 
burden  all  turned  to  silver,  and  sometimes  even  the 
tiny  forms  of  flowers. 


CHAPTER  LII 

SHIPWRECKED 

ABOUT  two  o'clock  we  came  into  Algeciras,  the  Spanish 
town  which  faces  Gibraltar,  and,  awaking  a  sleepy  por- 
ter at  the  hotel,  made  him  promise  to  call  us  in  two 
hours  and  fortify  us  with  coffee.  Next  morning  we 
opened  our  eyes  on  a  grey  and  windy  dawn.  All  around 
there  was  a  stir  and  roar,  as  of  winds  howling  through 
all  the  hollows  of  the  earth,  and  seas  reverberating  on 
every  shore.  After  a  breakfast  of  rolls  and  coffee,  we 
found  the  launch  that  was  to  take  us  to  the  ship.  The 
harbour  was  seething,  and  the  captain  of  the  launch  was 
no  more  serene  than  the  weather.  It  wasn't  his  habit, 
he  said,  to  go  out  on  a  day  like  this,  and  it  was  bad  policy 
for  a  ship  to  brave  such  an  ocean.  You  had  to  take  a 
sea  like  that  if  it  caught  you  in  the  midst  of  a  voyage, 
but  it  wasn't  wise  for  creatures  born  without  fins  to 
court  it.  But  the  ship's  orders  were  that  we  must  come 
across,  if  we  were  to  share  in  her  immediate  departure. 
So  we  started.  In  a  moment  I  was  sick  unto  death.  All 
the  seven  seas  of  the  world  had  not  yet  prepared  me  for 
that  terrible  vertigo. 

Through  it  all  I  soon  gathered  that  Fred  was  sup- 
porting me  with  his  arm;  that  we  were  endeavouring 
to  keep  from  crashing  into  the  ship  which  was  tossing  on 
the  waves,  as  helpless,  it  seemed,  as  an  empty  walnut- 
shell  ;  and  that  the  only  safe  way  of  getting  us  up  was 
by  letting  down  a  rope  ladder  from  the  decks.  One  by 

416 


SHIPWRECKED  417 

one  the  rest  were  pulled  up — I  being  left  to  the  last  as 
the  helpless  and  fainting  member.  Then  some  one  spoke 
to  me;  there  was  a  rope  around  my  waist;  and,  while 
the  winds  and  waters  and  gray  skies  whirled  round  me 
like  dizzy  wheels,  some  one  put  a  rope  in  my  hand  and 
told  me  to  climb.  And  then  out  of  that  wreck  of  con- 
sciousness, some  old  arboreal  instinct  revived  within 
me,  and  half  fainting  as  I  was,  I  went  up  over  the  side 
of  the  ship,  swinging  over  the  tossing  waters  like  a  mon- 
key, and  fainted  again  at  the  top. 

When  I  really  came  to,  we  were  out  upon  the  howling 
Atlantic,  a  helpless  prey,  it  seemed,  to  winds  and  seas. 
For  days  the  tumult  continued,  and  I  lay  prone.  Then 
peace  fell  like  a  caress  upon  the  waters.  There  came 
calm  blue  days  and  a  breath  of  the  tropics.  We  were 
sliding  along  near  the  Azores,  over  a  sea  that  was  like 
a  quiet  pool,  calm,  misty,  languid.  Then,  for  the  first 
time,  I  had  a  chance  to  see  what  modifications  Gibraltar 
had  made  in  our  list  of  passengers.  A  welcome  modifi- 
cation, too !  For  we  had  picked  up  twenty  young  Ameri- 
can naval  officers,  who  had  seen  hard  service  in  the 
Mediterranean.  They  were  lads  of  all  degrees  of  social 
and  intellectual  attainment,  who  shared  but  one  thing 
in  common,  the  sense  of  insufferable  ennui.  They  had 
seen  some  of  the  hardest  service  of  the  war  in  the  Medi- 
terranean waters,  and  among  all  the  haunts  of  the  sub- 
marines, and  though  their  task  had  been  at  least  a  com- 
paratively cleanly  one — tolerably  free  from  mud 
and  cooties — it  had  had  its  own  peculiar  horrors, 
in  the  peculiar  nervousness  of  destroyer  service  and 
the  loneliness  of  that  watchful  cruise  upon  the 
sea. 

I  had  little  time  to  investigate  these  new  additions  to 
our  society,  however,  because  the  battle  of  wind  and  sea 


418  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

once  more  began.  We  had  turned  north  now,  and  it  was 
bitterly  cold.  Our  ship  had  no  heat,  and  most  of  us  were 
inured  to  the  tropics.  I  lay  below  with  all  my  wardrobe 
piled  on  top  of  me,  resigned  to  what  seemed  my  pros- 
pects of  ending  my  mortal  span. 

Once  a  wave  crashed  through  and  deluged  me.  Some 
one  came  and  doctored  the  porthole,  and  said  the  whole 
ship  was  wet,  and  went  away.  Some  one  else  dipped 
up  the  salt  water  in  which  all  my  property  was  swim- 
ming, and  an  Indian  boy  followed  and  mopped  up.  I 
got  off  the  worst  of  my  wet  things,  wrapped  myself  in 
the  comparative  warmth  of  a  steamer  rug  which  was  also 
wet,  but  which,  being  of  wool,  seemed  by  comparison 
dry.  Then  being  too  sick  to  stand,  I  moved  over  to  the 
little  couch  which  had  escaped  the  deluge,  and  settled 
down,  with  the  utmost  nonchalance,  to  my  misery. 
About  dusk,  Fred  came  to  my  door,  very  still,  very  grave 
and  subdued. 

"It  is  all  right  now,"  he  said. 

"All  right?"  I  asked  feebly. 

"Yes.    We  have  been  wrecked." 

I  thought  of  desert  islands  and  Robinson  Crmoe  and 
then  despairingly  of  Japan. 

Fred  proceeded  to  give  comforting  particulars.  Oh, 
yes,  we  could  limp  along  and  get  into  Boston.  Only  part 
of  the  decks  were  washed  away;  some  of  the  seamen 
had  been  carried  overboard  and  left  to  die  in  the  waves ; 
a  lot  of  the  others  were  laid  up  with  fractured  bones; 
and  the  salt  water  was  all  over  our  food  so  that  we 
should  have  to  survive  on  tea  and  crackers.  The  navy 
had  done  yeoman  service  through  it  all,  and  had  inspired 
everybody  with  confidence  they  did  not  feel  in  the  orig- 
inal personnel  of  the  ship.  And  he  drew  a  dramatic  pic- 


SHIPWRECKED  41  i» 

ture  of  them  all  huddled  together  aloft,  when  the  cap- 
tain had  been  ready  to  give  us  up,  in  momentary  expec- 
tation of  going  down,  while  I  had  lain  below  in  (lie 
unique  security  of  being  too  seasick  to  care. 

This  was  the  last  real  event  of  the  voyage.  We  were 
heading  now  for  Boston,  wirelessing  the  while  an  an- 
nouncement of  our  troubles  and  a  request  for  ambu- 
lances. At  dawn  the  next  morning  we  were  dumped  on 
our  own  shores. 

For  some  days  I  was  a  foreigner  in  my  own  land.  My 
clothes  were  odd,  and  my  accent  pronounced  to  be 
"English,"  and  my  social  customs  had  to  be  refitted  into 
the  schedules  of  busy  America.  But  as  I  slipped  back 
into  the  old  ways,  I  discovered  that  the  path  around  the 
world  was  still  a  part  of  my  life.  All  along  the 
way,  I  had  poured  letters  into  the  wide  seas  which  are 
the  only  road  to  Japan.  Where  they  went  to  I  cannot 
tell,  but  they  lost  themselves,  many  of  them,  en  route. 
As  for  replies,  I  seemed  always  to  flee  before  them,  like 
Gabriel  before  Evangeline.  But  after  I  reached  New 
York,  letters  from  Japan  began  to  arrive,  forwarded 
from  everywhere.  Now  all  the  world  loves  a  lover,  but 
the  world  as  a  geographical  entity  is  not  so  cordial,  and 
it  began  to  seem  as  if  the  vastness  and  roundness  of  this 
terrestrial  globe,  the  sheer  quantity  of  the  earth  and 
salt  water  that  may  lie  between  human  hearts,  bade  fair 
to  wreck  my  dearest  plans.  No  letters  of  mine  had  ar- 
rived in  Japan  for  some  time.  The  conclusions  were  ob- 
vious. The  epistles  that  did  get  through,  being  written 
at  such  diverse  dates,  complicated  misunderstandings. 
In  vain  I  protested.  A  protest  grows  cold  in  such  long 
transit.  I  cabled,  and  the  cables  got  stuck  in  mid-ocean. 
I  cursed  time  and  space  and  the  largeness  of  the  world. 


420  IN  THE  EYES  OF  THE  EAST 

At  last  came  a  desperate  and  resolute  letter  from  Syd- 
ney saying  that  he  had  resigned  his  job  and  had  taken 
passage  on  the  first  ship  leaving  harbour,  and  he  was 
coming  the  other  way  around  the  world  to  find  me. 
And  he  did. 


THE  END 


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